Meeting Someone Interesting
by Willow Elijah
Summary: Hiccup, Astrid, Fishlegs and Ruffnut all go to the same college. Fishlegs starts texting Astrid and she texts back, but he needs Hiccup's help, Hiccup becomes more and more involved in the texting, but Astrid is unaware of this. Hiccup/Astrid
1. Chapter 1

**Authors Note:**

 **RIN: Relatively Important Notice:** (That's not a real abbreviation) I had to change the mention of a band name in the first chapter. Turns out I should have read the agreements more carefully, you're not allowed to mention real band names. That's why I have now changed it to a fictional band name(Mutant Scarecrows) and fictional lyrics, although I haven't changed the song title because it didn't say anything about that. I also had to change the format of the texting conversation because they were not allowed to be in "keyboard dialogue."

If I've broken the rules and guidelines in some other way, let me know how. :)

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

It's 9.23 p.m. Astrid is sitting on the floor of her and Ruffnut's small dorm room, the is window open and she is listening to music and scrolling through Tumblr, bored out of her mind as she waits for Ruffnut to get back from the gym. That's when her phone makes a sound. It's a new Facebook message from Fishlegs.

"Hey." It says.

Fishlegs is a boy Astrid had met at a party a while ago. He was a tall boy with blonde curly hair swept back behind a camp cap and who usually had a skateboard at his hand, a hipster basically. The party was held for the purpose of new college students getting to know each other. Ruffnut, who was their mutual friend and in engineering at the same college as Astrid and him, had introduced them. It was only brief, but the next morning she had woken up to a friend request on Facebook, which she had accepted.

"Hey :)" She replies.

"What are you up to?" She soon receives back.

"Just listening to some music, nothing much. Wbu?"

"Nothing really. What are you listening to?"

"Mutant Scarecrows at the moment."

"What song?"

"The pros and cons of breathing."

"I love you baby, you give me a heart attack." Is the next message she receives.

Astrid's heart starts racing, _what is he doing?_ _Is he professing his love for her? This is weird._

"What?"

She sends it without thinking and immediately regrets it. _What if she hurt him now?_

"Oops, sorry! Sent it to the wrong person, hehe. Sorry."

"Oh, okay, yeah it surprised me, haha." She types.

"Anyway, so Mutant Scarecrows, huh? "I fear myself whenever you're near, and as our days disappear you become revered."

"Impressive, you really do know your Mutant Scarecrows lyrics like the back of your hand."

"I know it better than the back of my hand! I don't know about the back of your hand, but there are a lot of mysteries on the back of mine."

Astrid smiles as she reads the text.

"Like what?"

"Just the usual mysteries humankind face everyday. Like death for one, how can people just cease to exist, where do their minds go? Or like if the universe is infinite or finite and how both are just as hard to grasp. Those are just two of the mysteries at the back of my hand. What's at the back of your hand?"

"Just skin I think."

"How boring."

"I know, yours should be put in an exhibition."

"The fame would destroy me."

"Probably, but the world needs your philosophical thoughts. Ever thought of joining the philosophy course?"

"I think I'll stick to engineering."

Astrid finds herself a little disappointed that he won't be taking the philosophy course with her. Fishlegs is not in any of her courses. As the conversation dies out Astrid gets up to close her window, giving in to the cold breeze of September. You can clearly tell autumn is on its way, and it's arriving early this year. However, it's not raining, which is a rarity for Seattle.

She gets under the warm covers of her bed. This boy was an interesting texter, indeed. And she suddenly sees him in a new light, an interesting new light.

* * *

Fishlegs is sitting on the floor of their dorm room. Hiccup is lying on his bed, phone lighting up his face in the poorly lit room.

"Ask her what she's wearing." Hiccup says.

"Har har har" Fishlegs replies.

"Oh I'm sorry, this isn't sexting?" He says sarcastically.

"Shut up."

"What… Are… You… Up to…" Fishlegs recites as he types the message.

"Fishlegs everybody, asking the real questions." Hiccup says to no one really while scrolling mindlessly.

"She's listening to Mutant Scarecrows." Fishlegs says happily, ignoring Hiccup's sarcasm, who immediately reacts at the mention of the band name by jerking his head away from the screen to look at Fishlegs. He regains his cool quickly though and turns his head back to the screen.

"Ask her what song." And Fishlegs can tell he is trying to sound casual.

"The Pros and Cons of Breathing." He says moments later and Hiccup gives a nod. Fishlegs waits a while before he finally says "Give me a quote from the song, anything."

Hiccup looks at him, baffled. He was just about to quote the song, but he hesitates before finally saying, "I love you baby, you give me a heart attack, that's a quote from the song." He says, trying to keep a straight face. He doesn't exactly know why he wants to sabotage this for Fishlegs, who is now typing it without a second thought, he is his friend after all, but he can't help but feel annoyed that Fishlegs is using him to get on Astrid's good side, not that he really cares.

"What." Fishlegs says in a confused voice.

"What?" Hiccup asks.

"That was her reply … Why was that her reply, Hiccup?" He says with distress in his voice. Hiccup bursts out laughing, although he feels a little bad about what he just did. "That's not how the song goes, is it?" Fishlegs says with a look that makes it clear he is not amused. Hiccup only shakes his head at him slowly, trying to contain laughter and Fishlegs starts typing again furiously saying, "This is bad, this is bad," over and over again.

"Seriously now, give me some lyrics to the song." Fishlegs asks Hiccup once again, who hesitates, once again.

"You don't think this is going to backfire one day?" he says doubtingly.

"I don't care, please Hiccup."

"Why don't you just Google them?"

"I know you know them." Fish says, not missing a beat.

He sighs, "Fine." and thinks for a moment before settling on, "I fear myself whenever you're near, and as our days disappear you become revered." and then turning his attention back onto his phone once again, trying to block out Fishlegs, although he can't help but feel keen to hear her reply.

"Congratulations Hiccup, she's impressed." Fishlegs suddenly says, smiling. He recites the full text, "Impressive, you really do know your Mutant Scarecrow lyrics like the back of your hand."

Hiccup huffs at the answer. "I know it better than the back of my hand! I don't know about the back of her hand, but there are a lot of mysteries on the back of mine." He states and Fishlegs starts typing again. He wonders what he's typing but decides not to ask, trying to keep up his carefree façade.

"Like what, she asks."

He should have guessed Fishlegs stole his words once again. Still, Hiccup keeps going, not exactly knowing why. "Just the usual mysteries humankind face everyday. Like death for one, how can people just cease to exist, where do their minds go? Or like if the universe is infinite or finite and how both are just as hard to grasp." He says as Fishlegs types. "Think about it…" Hiccup continues. "How can something like space be infinite? But how can it end? There must be something beyond. Both are equally hard to get your head around."

"Yeah… Beats me…" Fishlegs says, not really hearing what he just said but mainly focusing on his phone. He recites what he just wrote. "…What's at the back of your hand?" He finishes with.

"Mmhmmm." Hiccup replies, going back to his uninterested demeanor.

"Just skin… I think." Fish reads.

Hiccup smiles and says, "How boring."

…

"Yours should be put in an exhibition." He reads aloud.

…

"The fame would destroy me." Hiccup answers. "Alright, enough of this, I'm going to sleep now." He says before Fishlegs can continue the conversation further. He gets under the covers and turns around, facing the wall. He doesn't want Fishlegs stealing any more of his words.

"Yeah, goodnight." Fishlegs says absentmindedly.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

It is the beginning of Astrid's first term of college. She is completely new to all of the new subjects she is taking and she barely knows anyone who is an English major, like her. Although Ruffnut, who is Astrid's best friend, does have lunch at the same time as she on most days, which is nice. It's nice to have someone to talk to whom she is completely comfortable with and has actually known for longer than a month, all of high school as well, in fact, Astrid thinks as her and Ruff enter the cafeteria.

She is hit by the scent of food. The cafeteria is the brightest place in the school because of the big windows covering most of the white walls and reaching down all the way to the floor. It almost has an aseptic feeling to it, a feeling which is usually subdued by all the pupils filling the, like everything else, white seats.

"So… How bored were you last night?" Ruffnut asks as they sit down at one of the white round tables spread out across the relatively small cafeteria.

"Very. Well at first… Did you ever come back from the gym or did you sleep on one of the machines?" Astrid says, smiling.

"I did come back in fact. But you were asleep and, as the master of stealth, I didn't wake you. And this morning I had early maths and you were still asleep."

"That explains it. You're going to wear yourself out."

"Eh, I'll get by." Says Ruffnut while Astrid takes the awkward first bite of her apple.

"But what did you do, then?" Ruffnut asks and Astrid gives her a questioning look as she chews. "You said you were bored at first." she reminds her as she leans back in her chair, she hasn't started on her pasta salad.

"Yes! Right, well… I was quite surprised by it, but Fishlegs texted me." Ruffnut leans in again as the new information peeks her interest.

"What! Really?" she says and picks up a salad leaf from her salad.

"Yeah." Astrid replies, looking at Ruffnut who is chewing her leaf absentmindedly and staring out one of the big windows of the cafeteria.

"God, that's disgusting, stupid healthy food." But she keeps chewing. She finally puts down her leaf and says "I spend most of my days with him in class but I didn't know he was interested in my best friend."

To which Astrid adds, "It doesn't necessarily mean that he's interested in me though."

But Ruffnut isn't having it. "Yes he is. But the important thing is: are you?" She asks, raising her eyebrows.

"Actually, I think I might be." Astrid says slowly.

"Really?" Ruffnut asks in a disbelieving voice. "Fishlegs? I mean sure he's cool and all with his skateboard, but that is just to compensate for lack of personality. I mean _Hiccup_ has more personality than him." Hiccup is another boy she met at the same party. He's kind of skinny with brown hair and doesn't really say much; he mostly wears jeans, a t-shirt and a hoodie and is in engineering with the rest of them. "And here they come." Ruffnut says in a knowing voice.

She's not wrong. Fishlegs and Hiccup just joined the noisy cafeteria. They usually don't join Ruffnut and she, but this time Ruffnut waves them over and as they put down their trays on their table, greeting them Astrid smilingly says, "I love you baby, you give me a heart attack." looking at Fishlegs and emphasising every word. Hiccups snorts at Astrid's words while toying with his apple and Fishlegs look at him. Hiccup, realising what he just did, quickly regains his nonchalant facial expression. Fishlegs turns his head toward Astrid again and he laughs.

"Yeah, um, sorry about that, I was supposed to send it to someone else." He explains.

"He was supposed to send it to me." Ruffnut jokes. She has caught up with what the conversation is about.

"Jesus Christ, Ruffnut!" Fishlegs says while laughing.

"Anyway, so I saw Eret at the gym yesterday." Ruffnut announces confidently to Fishlegs and Hiccup who both respond with a tired look. "What?" She says, and pretends to be unknowing of why she receives the look. Fishlegs just sighs loudly.

"Wait. Who is this Eret and why am I only hearing about him now? Is he the reason why you were at the gym for so long yesterday?" Astrid asks accusingly.

"He's a god who erupted from the sky. Any day now he'll ask me to go with him to Asgard where I will be the quee-"

"He's going to be our substitute teacher for a while onwards, we only got him like a couple of days ago." Hiccup answers Astrid, finally. "He's one of those stereotypical buff macho guys, who apparently, hangs out at the gym, no surprise there." He says sarcastically. "Probably your type." He adds as he looks away.

"And that," Ruffnut takes over, "Is why I didn't tell you, I needed to get in the lead before he sees your blonde head." But Astrid isn't focusing on what she is saying.

"What do you mean my type? How do you know what my type is?" Astrid says, putting Hiccup on the spot. He didn't exactly say it in a condescending voice, but Astrid knows he didn't mean it in a positive way.

"I'm just a good guesser." He says plainly, putting his fork in an olive and sticking it in his mouth, as if that ends the conversation, which it does because Astrid looks at the time and realises she needs to get to class. "Sorry guys" she says as she clumsily grabs her backpack and tray. "Got to run. Catch you later …maybe… long day ahead." She adds as she guides herself out of the crowded cafeteria.

* * *

When Astrid gets back to their dorm room at five Ruffnut is already inside.

"Heeey!" She hears Ruffnut's cheery voice from her computer desk.

Astrid replies with a much less enthusiastic hey and lays, or more correctly, falls down on her bed.

"Rough day, huh?" Ruffnut says, far too happily.

She raises her head slightly from its resting position on the bed and her hair falls in front of her face as she tilts it toward Ruffnut, but not bothering to fix it she answers, "I mean, psychology is interesting an all, but when it's four in the afternoon and you haven't had a meal since 12, yes, it is rough." She rests her head again. "Shouldn't you be at the gym with Eret right now?" she says into her mattress and her voice is deafened.

"The gym? No. He'll survive one day without me."

"The question is if you will." She says into the mattress again.

 _"_ _Besides,"_ Ruffnut starts, ignoring Astrid. "I've got something for you." And she throws something on the bed. "That'll cheer you up."

Slowly, Astrid puts her hands flat on both her sides and pushes herself up to see that Ruffnut just chucked a box of cookies on her bed, chocolate chip cookies. She looks at Ruffnut and her eyes fill with tears.

" _Really? You're going to cry?"_

Astrid laughs, "No. But I might as well. This is the best thing that could have happened right now." And she fills with thankfulness toward Ruffnut. "Slumber party!" she says jokingly.

They put on some more comfortable attire and sit down on the mat on the floor with their backs leaning against the side of Astrid's bed. It turns out Ruffnut didn't just get them cookies, but also chips and chocolate and everything is right with the world.

"So what are you going to do about Fish" Ruffnut says as she puts a chip in her mouth.

"I'll just wait and see what happens." She says through a mouthful of chips. "What are you going to do about Eret?"

"I'll think of something, although there is the problematic factor of him being my teacher, sort of. But we'll get around that in some way." She says in a trouble-free voice.

The conversation fades and they both start laughing slightly, "Some guy talk, huh?" Ruffnut laughs. "Oh, and why doesn't Hiccup like you?" She suddenly asks curiously and by the look she receives from Astrid, she realises that this is clearly news to her.

"What! What do you mean he doesn't like me? What did he say?" She says frantically.

"Well…" She starts, slightly perplexed. "It's not something he's said, but … I don't know, he's just quiet when you're around, doesn't say as much as he does when it's just me and Fish with him."

"Maybe he's just shy because he doesn't know me that well."

"Yeah maybe. Eh, just ignore it I reckon." She says with a wave of her hand.

"No, I want to make friends. I have barely made any friends here." She argues.

"And whose fault is that?" She says amusedly.

"Mine I guess, but I don't know, no one in my courses really interest me, they're all so …plain."

They sit there and talk about nothing for a while before they finally go to bed after having eaten all of the snacks. It's not _slumber party_ fun, but it's pretty nice.

As she puts her head on her pillow, it's as if her previously tried brain wants to spite her and she suddenly doesn't feel tired one bit. Reaching for her desk drawer next to her bed, she pulls out her headphones to put on some calming music. As she doesn't have any new music added on Spotify, she simply presses the shuffle button on a list of some slow songs. And she is not disappointed as an old song from her childhood starts playing. She hesitates on skipping it, knowing better than to delve into thoughts from her childhood. Mentally she is feeling good, so she decides she can handle it and let's the song play.

She lies down trying to find a comfortable position, but the song wells up feelings of sadness in her chest and she knows it's too late. Nostalgia has etched itself inside her and she is showered with childhood memories she's rather now think about right now. The strange thing is, they are not bad memories. They are happy and beautiful memories of summers spent with her parents and etc. But she can't help but feel saddened by them whenever she is feeling like this, sad that they are over and how time has stretched out between her and the memories, creating a big wall and a feeling of distance from them.

She looks over at the time: 12.07 a.m. Ruff fell asleep a long while ago. Loneliness takes its hold on her. The drawer beside her bed reminds her of a cabinet in her home back with her parents. It stands in her living room at home. It's bright blue. She can't tell how long it's been since she opened one of those drawers, no one ever does anymore. It doesn't even make sense that it's kept; there are only old sketching books full of ugly colourful drawings she made when she was little. Basically everything else in their home has been replaced since then, and she bets if she was too look in there now, the inside of the drawers would be filled with dust and the objects in it has probably gone untouched for more than several years. She barely notices that cabinet anymore. It's strange how when you spend so much time around certain things, after a while you stop noticing them and it's as if the walls swallow them and they cease to exist, they become abstract.

And on that thought Astrid drifts into an unknowing state until she finally falls asleep, not waking until her alarm buzzes the next morning.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

The next morning Astrid meets Fish and Hiccup in the hallway on her way to class, which she has been rushing to this whole morning because she got up half an hour later than she was supposed to. Her face is clear of make up and she is wearing a flannel shirt and jeans, she's got her bag hung over her shoulder and a water bottle at hand. The thing is that she doesn't feel very made up, but she is comfortable and confident in her attire, she likes her looks more when they are not too glued on.

"Are you in a rush?" Fishlegs asks and she checks her watch.

"No, it seems I've rushed so much that I have caught up with time." She laughs while wondering if that even makes sense but Fish seems to go with it.

"So how was the day yesterday? When did you get off?"

"I got off at 4.40," She says tiredly. "I was literally the definition of tired… Ruffnut cheered me up though, with some sugar." She glances at Hiccup, who is now looking at his phone, seemingly uninterested.

"It's the best medicine." Fishlegs says jokingly and she nods.

"Yeah… But today I finish early, so that'll be good."

"We also finish early," He says looking at Hiccup who momentarily looks up and nods, looks quickly at Astrid and down again. "At 3.30, so if you want to, you can come over?" He says.

Astrid looks at Hiccup again; he moves his shoulder too make room for someone passing by, not looking away from the screen. She dreads that Ruffnut's words were true last night. She doesn't want someone to dislike her, to think that she is only into stereotypical buff guys, (not that there is anything wrong with those type of guys.) when in reality that is not the truth.

"That'd be great. I'll be there by 3.30, but right now," she looks at the time: 8.21 "I need to get to class, bye." She looks at Hiccup and says, "Goodbye Hiccup," Like it's a statement. To which he slightly raises his head before moving his eyes to her and gives her a short 'bye'. She hurries off.

* * *

Astrid walks up to Fishlegs' door, it's 4.30, she had to stay back for an hour after class for a project but nevertheless she is in a cheery mood, she just got inside and the sun was shining although it was still chilly. She knocks on the door and Fish opens it, greeting her and leading her to what she decides is a small living room, there is a TV, a couch and two big pillows on the floor, one of which Ruffnut is currently occupying, she is lying on her stomach across it with her eyes fixed on the TV screen. There is one window and it is one of the only things illuminating the room, the other is a small lamp sitting on the wall above the couch.

Despite the poor lighting and lack of homeliness, Astrid also notices how _clean_ it is _,_ not cafeteria clean, but nevertheless, cleaner than she imagined, definitely cleaner than her and Ruffs apartment. She can't help but feel a curiosity growing inside her at who of them is the clean one.

Astrid is woken from her ponderings by hearing a loud "Nooo!" from Ruff. She is playing super Mario bros on a WII. Fishlegs hands Astrid a third game controller and sits down on the pillow next to Ruffnut, but there is a knock on the door and Fish lets out a sigh, getting up once again.

"I'm so good at this game." And overly confident Ruffnut states.

"It's not one of the hardest games to be honest." Astrid argues. She, herself, is quite good at the game since she has played it a lot through the years after getting it as a Christmas present from her parents.

"Don't you have keys?" Astrid hears Fishlegs ask out in the hallway.

"I do in fact, but I forgot about them. You know, sometimes people forget things." She hears Hiccups voice.

"Yeah, in your hurry to get out of here, what have you been doing for the past hour?"

"I've been getting some things done in the library. What have you been doing? How long was Astrid here for?"

"She's just got here actually," Fish walks into their room again.

"…Oh! Okay!" She hears Hiccup out in the hallway, a little too enthusiastically for it being genuine, she notes.

"And Ruffnut's been here for a while." He says as Hiccup enters the room with him.

"And if I hadn't, we wouldn't be in world three already." Says Ruff.

Hiccup sits down on the couch, sliding his phone out of his pocket and Astrid looks at him, frowning. "You don't want to play?"

Hiccup looks up from his phone, "Nah, we only have three controllers. And I don't really feel like it." He says with a wave of his hand, looking disinterested.

"C'mon Astrid, you've died like four times now." Says an annoyed Ruffnut.

They play for a while and Astrid hears rain starting to patter the window. She looks away from the screen to find they are now sitting in a dark room, lit up only by the streetlights outside and the feeble lamp. Astrid was planning on going to the library tonight to study, but now that seems even less appealing given how it's located on the other side of the dark campus and she would be walking there by herself.

It's hard to concentrate on the game when Hiccup is sitting there on the couch, not really doing anything, he must be bored. She looks over at him at the same time as he looks over at her, which caused Astrid to hurriedly continue the game. "We should do something else." She states, pausing the game and getting the others attention. "Don't you have that app on your phone, where you're supposed to point at someone?"

Ruffnut smiles, "You mean 'Who in the room?'" She plucks up her phone from the floor. "I haven't played that one in a while."

"It's pretty fun," she says, looking between Hiccup and Fish. "You read a question like, 'who in the room would steal a car?' and you have to point to someone in the room who you think would be the most likely candidate."

Fish also smiles, "Alright that sounds fun, although I doubt anyone in this room would steal a car." He laughs.

"Yeah, well, no probably not, but you get the gist." She says, making two bunny ears with her fingers at the word "gist".

They all sit down in a circle on the floor.

Ruff starts, "Who in the room is the worst at doing the dishes?" and Astrid points to Ruff who points to herself. Hiccup points to Fish and Fish points at himself. _Guess that settles the question of who does the cleaning around here,_ Astrid thinks to herself.

Ruff smiles, "Who gets drunkest at parties?" Most of them point at Ruff.

"Who in the room is religious?" They all just look at each other curiously.

"Next!" Ruff exclaims, "Who in the room is the most artistic?"

Fish points at uncomfortable looking Hiccup. "And misses half of most classes because you can never tear your eyes from your notepad."

"Who in the room spends most time on their looks? … Well that's a mean one let's not do that one." But it's too late because Hiccup has already pointed to Astrid.

" _Really?"_ Astrid says slowly. "You're just going to assume something like that?"

"Well, it's fairly obvious. Doesn't take much brain to guess." Hiccup says nonchalantly, which aggravates Astrid even more, but she pauses. After a while she finally shrugs and says, "I honestly don't: spend a lot of time on my looks, some people don't need to and they'll look great anyway." She smiles smugly at Hiccup. "And even if I did, so what? There's nothing wrong with that."

"Whatever, let's do the next one." Hiccup says, impartially.

"Alright," a tentative Ruffnut replies, looking between Hiccup and Astrid as though they are a time bomb. "Let's get on with it. Who in the room is the most arrogant?" But she regrets it immediately, for Astrid slowly raises her hand and points directly at Hiccup who squints.

"Let's not play this game anymore hey Fish can I show you that thing?" Ruff says quickly and they both walk out of the room hastily and try to ignore Astrid and Hiccup who don't really seem to care about what's going on around them.

"Now who's the one making assumptions?" Hiccup says.

Astrid huffs, "At least mine are based on something."

"Oh just because I stated a fact you're going to tag me as arrogant?" Hiccup retorts in a raised voice, his arms crossed.

Astrid stands up, "I wouldn't call it stating fact if you have no evidence."

"Oh please, no one effortlessly-" But he stops mid sentence. It's like he realised something.

"Whatever, I need to leave now." Astrid says in a softer voice, walking out of the room. She looks over at the other two, who are now sitting by a desk, doing something on the computer, completely ignoring Astrid and Hiccup's argument. She registers the room, which she didn't get a chance to when she first came in here through the front door. This room is about the same size as their "living room" and it contains a desk, a small table, an oven, a sink and a fridge, so basically a small kitchen. There are three other doors leading away from the room, which Astrid assumes is two bedrooms and a bathroom.

She walks up to the door she entered when she first got there. "Hey Fish, Ruff, I'm leaving." She says while opening the door.

"Yeah alright" they say in sync. "See you back in our room?" Ruff adds.

"I'm actually going to head to the library so I might not be back when you get back."

Ruff turns "The Library? That's on the other side of campus." She says in a surprised tone.

"Shocker." Says Astrid. "I need to, they have that book on the French revolution, I'm writing a paper on it." She says while leaning against the doorframe.

"Just Google the damn thing you idiot."

Astrid sighs in frustration "I would if I could but there are questions and … you couldn't find that online … Ugh, I'm leaving anyway." She's done trying to explain.

"But no! What! You can't walk alone. It's dark."

"It's only 7 o'clock." Astrid says, taking a look at her phone.

"Fine, suit yourself."

"I can walk with you." A soft nasal voice says from behind her. She turns around.

"It's alright Hiccup, I'm not going to annoy you any more than I clearly already have." Astrid says in resignation. She's surprised as she hears her voice crack at the end of the sentence and is filled with dread that Hiccup might have noticed. _What is it she's feeling? Is it genuine hurt?_ A wave of dread fills her at the thought of someone she just met having hurt her.

Hiccup turns his head, searching for something around the room and leans over to grab a math book and a red notepad from the table next to them. "You're not annoying me, I need to study as well and I'm not going to get anything done if I stay here while Fish and Ruff have a super smash bros tournament." He says knowingly while taking hold of the door and gesturing for her to walk out, which she does with a roll of her eyes. But Hiccup doesn't see that.

They walk out in the rain. Astrid has got a sweater over her shirt, so she's not too cold. She worries her hair will get wet and cold soon however.

She looks at Hiccup, who is looking at the ground, one hand in his pocket, another carrying his book and pad. "I wish I'd brought a hat though." Astrid says.

"Yeah… Your hair is going to get ruined." He says still looking at the ground.

"Jeeesus Christ, I meant because I'll get cold!" Astrid says exasperatedly.

"Fine." Hiccup says, putting and end to that topic of conversation. It's quiet for a minute. "And by the way, before, I didn't mean … it wasn't because you look good or anything, that's not why I think you spend a lot of time on your looks."

"… Thanks for clearing that up?" Astrid replies with sarcasm. "And I thought you were going to apologize there for a second. How could I be so clueless?"

"Why would I apologize?" He says, perplexed.

Astrid could not believe he could be so ignorant. "Perhaps because you made a snap judgement about me that turned out to be _wrong_." She says while flinging her arms.

"How can you be so sure that it was wrong?"

"Because I know myself." Astrid says and they both look around and realise they have stopped in front of the library. Astrid starts walking up the stairs and Hiccup follows. "And if you haven't noticed..." Astrid starts, in a now very angry voice. "I am trying to be polite, trying to build a possible relationship. But you make no effort, whatsoever to make this any easier." She says as she turns around facing him and gestures between them both.

"What do you mean relationship? Aren't you trying to get with Fish?" Hiccup says confused.

"Oh my god, I mean that we can be friends! A relationship doesn't have to be inherently romantic." Astrid feels a slight blush forming on her cheeks at the awkwardness of Hiccup misunderstanding her, so she quickly turns around and heads toward the bookcase where the book she came for is located, before her blush has settled on her cheeks.

The small school library is usually quite empty since most of the information provided can now be found online. But Astrid likes to come here anyway. It's quite old looking, like the rest of the school. The walls are coated with some dark wood, the ceiling is high and the floor is made of stone. There are also a few paintings on the walls, which is nice to look at. The seats are quite comfortable, covered in leather. The rest of the school has been renovated and upgraded, but you can tell the library has stayed the same over the years and it's like an ancient cultural piece in the midst of the otherwise modernized school.

She knows exactly where to look for her book and when she found it Hiccup has already sat down at one of the wooden tables and is leaning over his red notepad. Ignoring him, Astrid settles for a table cross from his, about five, or so, meters away. She puts her book on the table and her notepad so that she can take a look at the questions supplied in the book, which Mr Lancaster has assigned for them to answer as a start of the assignment. She steals a glance at Hiccup who is sitting across from her, leaning against the leather seat, knees up against his body and his notepad leaning against his knees. He's concentrating hard on the notepad and has left his math book behind on the table. Suddenly he looks up and meets Astrid's gaze, who immediately looks down at her pad again.

They sit there for about an hour. Neither of them getting any work done, but both of them stealing glances at each other every now and then. Finally Astrid gets up to head back to her dorm room, leaving Hiccup behind. Just as she's about to close the door to the library however, Hiccup is right behind her.

"Did you get your work done?" Hiccup asks.

"Yep." Astrid lies. "Did you? You looked very productive."

"Yeah I got loads done." He says enthusiastically. "No math however." He adds. And Astrid asks no further questions.

The walk back from the library is not the emotional rollercoaster that the walk _to_ the library was. It's peaceful, instead. The rain is still pouring; it's been going on non-stop for a couple of hours now. But it's a peaceful rain the kind of rain Astrid loves.

"I love rain." Astrid says without thinking.

"Me too." Hiccup says simply. And it's the last thing they say except for bye before they part at the door to Hiccups dorm room. Astrid keeps walking to the end of the same hallway before entering her room to find it dark. Ruffnut is lying in her bed. Astrid makes her way into the bathroom to quickly brush her teeth and change into pyjamas before she tries to guide herself toward her bed, and as she lies down, Ruffnut teasingly whispers, "How was the date?"

Astrid is too tired to argue, so instead plays along, "Spectacular."


	4. Chapter 4

**Authors note:**

 **RIN: Relatively Important Notice:** (That's not a real abbreviation) I had to change the mention of a band name in the first chapter. Turns out I should have read the agreements more carefully, you're not allowed to mention real band names. That's why I have now changed it to a fictional band name(Mutant Scarecrows) and fictional lyrics although I haven't changed the song title because it didn't say anything about that. I also had to change the format of the texting conversation because they were not allowed to be in "keyboard dialogue."

If I've broken the rules and guidelines in some other way, let me know how. :)

* * *

 **Chapter 4**

Hiccup would like to think that he is a kind and polite person. He's a Hufflepuff, you could say, but for some reason, every time he is around Astrid he turns into an ignorant prick.

 _It's all probably true though. She probably spends loads of time on her appearance, she probably only falls for that typical buff guy Eret with that sort of obvious, movie star beauty … But on what grounds am I making these judgements? Besides, even if it was true, why does it matter?_

 _Because that means she's exactly like the girls I encountered in high school._

Over the weekend, Hiccup tries to pay attention to Fishlegs texting conversations with Astrid, to try and get an idea of what she really is like, if she really is the way that Hiccup imagines the blonde girl. Luckily, Fish doesn't make it very hard for him, he almost drags Hiccup into the conversations. Although Hiccup doubts that Astrid is even aware on the other side of the line. Hiccup isn't even sure what leads him into the situation, but at one point, Fish even leaves the room for five minutes and Hiccup is left instant messaging with Astrid all by himself with Astrid completely unaware that it's not actually Fish. It kind of feels like catfishing, and it feels wrong. Fishlegs however, hasn't commented on the fact and doesn't seem too bothered with it. And, Hiccup has to admit to himself, that he kind of enjoys his conversations with Astrid and it's probably the reason he doesn't call Fish out on it.

Turns out, Astrid knows basically every _Mutant Scarecrow_ song, and her favourite album is _Take this to your grave._ She hates everything to do with math and she also hates TV shows for some unknown reason, she likes movies better. She often manages to deliver witty yet profound one-liners in her replies, which tend to make Hiccup grin although he desperately tries not to. She seems light-hearted although it is texting after all. It's been raining for the whole weekend and she never misses a chance to comment on it, although they are never in a negative light unlike the usual complaints from people. To Hiccup's jealousy, it turns out Astrid is an only child. With Hiccup's three sisters and 19 years of watching high school musical and hearing about feminism, he can say for a fact, that he is jealous.

He lays down to fall asleep as his exhaustion catches up to him. He closes his eyes for a minute, but his mind won't slow down and thoughts of home enter his mind. He finds that he misses his home. Before he left for college he felt relieved at the chance of a fresh start, hopeful that he will make new friends here who accept him, felt that he couldn't get here any sooner. Although despite everything he's been through back home, he misses his family like crazy for the first time since he left. Without them, he would not have survived his high school years. Hiccup drifts into a daze, which in time, transforms into a deep sleep with few dreams.

 **Authors Note:**

Next update will be up tomorrow(9th of July 2015) and it will contain heaps of Astrid/Hiccup interaction.

If you're a reader of my story, feel free to write me a review with some constructive criticism, doesn't have to be long, doesn't have to be short. :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Authors Note:**

 **RIN: Relatively Important Notice:** (That's not a real abbreviation) I had to change the mention of a band name in the first chapter. Turns out I should have read the agreements more carefully, you're not allowed to mention real band names. That's why I have now changed it to a fictional band name(Mutant Scarecrows) and fictional lyrics although I haven't changed the song title because it didn't say anything about that. I also had to change the format of the texting conversation because they were not allowed to be in "keyboard dialogue."

If I've broken the rules and guidelines in some other way, let me know how. :)

* * *

Before I get on with the story I will reply to two reviews I have received. The first one regarding the possibility of Fish and Astrid going out, which they will not be in this fic. Don't worry! Also, Astrid will find out at some point about a lot of the texts being from Hiccup, I will not tell you when, however.

The second reviewer asked the question of if Hiccup and Fishlegs will get into some sort of feud over Astrid. (At least that was how I interpreted the question.) And no they will not, the thought of it makes me a little bit sick, to be honest. So you don't have to worry either! We're on the same page.

Thank you for asking questions and saying what you think, and also for reading. Keep doing it if you want. :)

* * *

 **Chapter 5**

The next morning at 9.24 a.m. on a lecture, a boring lecture, Fish is texting Astrid. Or at least Hiccup assumes he is. He looks over as he is sitting right beside him, and much to Hiccup's assumptions, her name is right there on his phone.

"Where are you now?" He reads below Fishlegs name.

"I'm in the Nadder for philosophy class and it just started."

(The buildings on campus are named after mythical dragons.)

"Let's play a question asking game." Fish has written.

"All right, you go first."

To Hiccup's surprise, although he really shouldn't be surprised by this sort of thing anymore, Fish hands Hiccup the phone. He's clearly noticed that Hiccup has been looking at their messages.

"Ask her questions. You're better at that stuff." He says.

Without thinking, Hiccup takes the phone from him. He stares at it as if he's expecting it to speak at any moment. He looks up at the room full of people, his eyes travel toward his professor. She is looking very serious and speaks with much sincerity, but his eyes are heavy from tiredness and he can't think of a question, the room is too bright and he rubs his eyes excessively. He tries a different approach. _What am I curious to know about Astrid?_ He types out a question.

"What makes you sad?" He types.

Hiccup glances at Fishlegs, he is listening intently to what the teacher is saying now and is taking notes even. He really doesn't care to know what Hiccup is writing.

"That's quite a personal question to start of with."

Under normal circumstances, this statement would have made Hiccup insecure. But it's not really Hiccup typing these words; it's Fishlegs. At least from Astrid's point of view it is, and it gives Hiccup a sense of security and confidence.

At that moment, he notices that she's typing. He looks at the three dots for a while, waiting for her message to appear on the screen. It takes quite a while and Hiccup realises that this is the second time since Fish started texting with Astrid that Hiccup is actually the one typing, completely in charge. Finally, her message appears.

"The thing that makes me the saddest, the thing that can make me scream from hurt and cry in the middle of the night or the middle of the day, or anytime for that matter, is nostalgia. I've had an amazing childhood and I'm very lucky for it, so I don't know why every time I delve deep into my mind to ponder over old times I well up. But I do. My mum and dad would take me out with their boat when I was little over the summer, and it was one of those boats that you could spend the night in. So we would anchor it near some beach on small remote islands and stay through the night. And when mum drove it, I would always sit at the front of the boat, with a lifejacket bigger than myself and laugh as the boat jumped as it hit the waves, and they would be terrified that I would fall off, but they would still let me because it made me so happy. I guess what makes me sad is the fact that we don't do that anymore, it's sad how when we grow up, those times get lost."

For some reason Hiccup smiles. He finds it amazing how brave she is by being so unapologetically honest about herself and her feelings.

"That does sound like a great childhood." He sends.

"Yeah, they're pretty great parents. Sorta miss them now that I'm here, away from home for the first time. Anyway now it's your turn, same question."

The reason he decides to tell her is because he feels close to Astrid after having heard her story; he wants to feel even more connected to her.

"I was bullied all through high school. It started freshman year. I was quite reserved, as I still am I guess, most of the people in my grade were girls and they were horrible to me. The only thing that made it better was my little sister, she was small like me and the youngest in our family, but always surprisingly confident, and everyone loved her for being very open and very much herself, so she was able to get them off my back a lot of the time, she would always stand up for me, but the bullying continued when she was not around. I have a lot to thank her for, though. Anyway, thinking about those times can make me really sad, but mostly angry I guess."

"What a great sister you've got. I would very much like to meet her someday.

"Yeah, you'd love her. And that would be a relief for me as well, maybe you could sit through the movies she likes, so I don't have to. I'm talking everything from sparking vampires to singing high schoolers. She loves that crap, or she just enjoys my suffering, either of those two."

"Hahah, and don't forget spell casting witches and three headed dogs! :'D"

"If you are referring to the Harry Potter movies … How dare you group something as brilliant as the story of Harry Potter with sparkling vampires and singing high schoolers?! How. Dare. You. Harry Potter is a piece of ART."

Hiccup is absorbed in the conversation he's having with Astrid and finally when he stops typing and presses send he realises that he has Fishlegs' eyes on him. The room has gone oddly quiet. He looks up to find that not only Fishlegs, but also the whole room is looking at him. Ruffnut's smug smile a few rows down is all he registers before he realises his professor is speaking to him. Anger has been added to her previously serious expression.

"… You've been staring at that phone of yours for a while now; I will not tolerate students attending my lectures while not paying attention. Collect your things, and leave." She gestures at the door.

Hiccup gets up, and hands the phone to Fishlegs, who is wearing an apologetic look as he takes the phone from him, and that's when he realises, on top of it all, that he's made a big mistake. He gets out of the classroom, it feels like an hour passes before he finally enters the empty hallway and sits down on the floor leaning against the wall; he puts his face in his hands at the embarrassment. _I must've looked like a complete idiot smiling dumbly at my phone not realizing that everyone was looking at me._ He thinks back to Ruffnut's face smiling so smugly at him. And how he'd looked down at the floor, not even meeting his professor's eyes as he hurried out of there. But then he thinks of his even bigger problem. He had completely forgotten that he had been texting with Fishlegs phone during his conversation with Astrid and now, Astrid thought that that story of Hiccup being bullied was about Fish! He couldn't bloody well tell her the truth; she'd know that they'd been lying to her. _They._ It pained Hiccup to admit it, but in reality, he was in on it as much as Fishlegs. There was no denying: they'd both been lying to Astrid this whole time.

Astrid, who in that precise moment appears walking along the corridor and as he meets her eyes, he quickly looks away down at his knees and feels another wave of shame. _Shit! Why didn't I greet her? It's too late now. This day has just been a series of awkward moments so far, and all of them relating to him interacting with Astrid in some way._ He looks up to see if she's passed him already, only to find her sitting across from him looking at him with a searching look. He notices she's adapted her clothing options to the weather conditions; she is wearing a pair of fingerless gloves and a scarf, in contrast to the last time he saw her.

"Hey." She says without a smile.

"Hey, weren't you—" But he cuts of in the middle of the sentence. _Jeeesus Christ I'm really walking on thin ice today._ He was just about to ask her how come she's here, when she had just said she was in the Nadder. He settles instead for a "Aren't you supposed to be in class right now?" He really tries hard to not make it sound as if he's accusing her of something; he tries to sound as gentle as he can.

"Um yeah, I am actually..." She smiles in embarrassment. "But honestly… I was sent out of there for texting. My teacher doesn't 'tolerate' that." She says and he can tell that she is quoting her teacher, who had probably given her the same speech he was given. " _Clearly,"_ she adds, _"_ given how I'm sitting here with you instead of attending." She says with a laugh and gestures toward him.

Hiccup smiles and nods almost invisibly; he can't believe she was sent out as well.

"Anyway. So I just thought I'd wait out here for Ruffnut to finish so that we can have lunch. Why are you out here, then?"

Hiccup smiles. "Uh, you're not going to believe it. But funnily enough, I was sent out for texting too." He reckons it's safe to tell her the truth, she can't possibly know who he was texting.

Astrid's eyes go wide. "What a coincidence!" She laughs. "…Wooow, I thought it was just my teacher who really can't handle texting. I wonder why Fish hasn't been sent out… He was the one I was texting." She further explains.

Hiccup plays along, even though he knows perfectly well why Fish is still in there, and he's out here. "He's probably better at hiding it than us. More discrete." He assures her, while nodding.

She starts laughing suddenly. "Well, yeah that's probably it, as I can assure you, I was anything but discrete." She smiles at the memory while looking at the floor. "For one I was sitting like this," and she holds up her phone in front of her face, touching the screen forcefully with her thumbs. Illustrating how she had acted in class. "And secondly, I started to giggle, not in a subtle way, and that was when I was sent out." She finishes and her hands fall to rest on her lap. Hiccup's pulse quickens at what Astrid just told him. She had _laughed._ She had been sent out of that lecture because she had been laughing at Hiccup's texts. He suddenly felt content with the turn out of today's events. All the anxiety today has brought upon him has been wiped out, because of Astrid.

 _Fuck Hiccup's cute._ Astrid can't help but think as she watches him react to what she's saying. She can tell he's uncomfortable because he's unable to even meet her eye for the length of a second. She gets the urge to grab his head and force him to look her in the eye. But she won't. He's cute when he widens his eyes at something she's saying, or adds a small 'really?'

"And secondly, I started to giggle, not in a subtle way, and that was when I was sent out." Astrid finishes and her hands fall to rest on her lap. Hiccup meets her eyes and smiles in response, his gaze falls to the floor, but his smile doesn't fade.

 _But he's a douche._ Astrid thinks. _He must be, everything he's done so far has pointed toward him being a douche… But sometimes… He's not. Sometimes, he's reserved and shy and everything that comes out of his mouth seems genuine. And they way he looks at me when I'm talking is like he doesn't judge; he simply listens. With his intense eyes, what colour were they? Green? And his forest green t-shirt that hangs loosely around his skinny chest and arms, and his too long jeans, and his messy brown hair framing his face so nicely. I could write a poem consisting of lines describing his looks. Fuck Hiccup's cute._

"Are we just going to sit here?" Astrid asks Hiccup, who is now sitting cross-legged before her.

"I don't know, what else is there to do?" Hiccup says and starts plucking at something on his bag.

"When does this lecture end?" She asks, checking the time on her phone. "It's merely 9.58 a.m."

"It goes on for a while I think." He stands up and walks over to look at the schedule on the door. "It finishes at 11 a.m." He sighs. "What to do, what to do…" He ponders while drumming on his thighs gently, looking around the corridor, as if he'd find some answers draped on the empty walls. His stomach makes a sound.

Astrid has an idea. "You know what? Lunchtime smunchtime. I'm hungry, I reckon we go to the cafeteria and get some food, we could go to the lookout, that's a nice place to pass the time." She says confidently while getting up. She looks at Hiccup. "You coming?"

Thu 9 July

Next update: 10 July


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

He nods and reaches for his bag on the floor. "What is this lookout place?"

"Behind campus, you've never been there?" She says as though she's been there a lot of times.

"Nope." He says, popping the p.

In truth, she's only been there once. It was during the first week when some people from English class had invited her. That was back when she was still trying to make new and interesting friends. She gave up on that a while ago. Or maybe she hasn't given up completely just yet. "So, how long have you known Fish for?" She asks as they walk the short walk toward the cafeteria.

He steals a quick look at her before looking ahead again. "All of high school basically, we know each other pretty well."

"Same as me and Ruffnut then." She states and they fall into a silence as they enter the cafeteria. They get their food that is in the form of sandwiches and walk through a short corridor, they turn and begin descending the stairs. Astrid doesn't want it to get awkward, so she keeps asking questions. "So, what do you wanna do as a career?"

Hiccup takes some air in through his mouth as if he's about to say something, but he hesitates. Finally he says, "I think I would want to be a teacher." As if he just realised it himself.

"That sounds like a good job … take a turn here." She says while motioning for them to turn and walk along the building toward the hill behind it.

"What about you, what do you want to be?"

"I honestly have no idea." She says, shaking her head. "I am interested in many subjects, but nothing that I would like to pursue full time as a career."

"I know what you mean, sometimes I wish I _didn't_ have so many options. That someone would just tell me, here, do this for the rest of your life." Hiccup says.

"Yeah, exactly." She stops in front of the rocky hill, it's long, but not very steep, they can almost walk straight, but it's been raining all morning and it's a little slippery. "There are no stairs, so we'll have to climb." And without hesitating, she begins the climb. "Be careful, as you can tell, it's a bit slippery." She adds.

Hiccup, a little taken aback, begins to climb. This was certainly not how he predicted this day would go. 40 minutes ago, he was sitting in a lecture hall full of people, feeling tired. But now, he is outside in the fresh, rain washed air, alone with Astrid and feeling energized. And he didn't even ditch class, he was _sent out_ of there. _I should text in class more often._ He is torn from his pondering by a sound of something scraping against the rocky surface. He looks up to the sight of Astrid, trying to regain her balance. "You alright?" He asks, unsure.

"Yeah, I'm fine, but like I said: It's a bit slippery." She says as she regains her balance. "We've soon reached the top." She says, looking upwards.

When they finally reach the top of the hill. Hiccup regains his posture and spares a moment to take in the sight. They can view all of Seattle from up here it seems like, but it probably stretches out even further than what's visible. They can see the Space Needle, in the distance, and a faded Mount Rainier, towering over the city. On a clear day, you could probably get an all right view of the mountain as well. They sit down on the stone ground to catch their breath.

"Beautiful isn't it?" Astrid says as she starts on her sandwich.

"Yeah, it's wonderful." He agrees as he reaches for the sandwich in his bag. As he digs for it, he holds up his red drawing pad in his left hand to see better.

A moment passes, before Astrid enthusiastically blurts, "That's a drawing pad." as though she's realizing something.

Hiccup stops what he's doing and looks at his left hand; the pad has opened itself so that she can see his sketches. He gives her a questioning look. "Not really seeing what the hype is about, Astrid."

"It's the same red one you brought to the library last week. But there are no calculations in there. It's _just_ a drawing pad." She says, mostly to herself. "Oh my god, you're not a douche. You're a good person, _in disguise_ as a douche." She finishes bluntly, looking Hiccup in the eye.

"First of all: …Thanks?" He says while squinting at her. "Secondly: …Why this sudden proclamation over a notepad?" He asks, although he thinks he knows where this is going. " _Drawing_ pad." He corrects himself.

"You didn't go with me to the library to do math. You used math as an _excuse_ to go with me to the library, so that I wouldn't have to walk there by myself." She says to an uncomfortable looking Hiccup. Astrid smiles at him. "Thank you." She adds, putting her hand on his wrist. The moment is fleeting, and she immediately takes her hand back, but Hiccup's pulse quickens, and he can still feel her hand where it was a moment ago, as if it's tattooed on him.

"You're welcome."

A chilly, mid-September breeze hits Astrid's face. She's glad she dressed warmer today. Hiccup is still wearing only a t-shirt. "Aren't you cold?"

"Yeah, a little, but I don't mind." He replies.

She can't tell if he's trying to sound tough, or if he genuinely doesn't mind. Her eyes travel down to the red notebook, still in his hand. "Can I see?" She nods at the pad and grabs it.

"…Sure." He says, but he takes it back. She scoots over so that she is sitting next to him instead.

He starts to flip through it rapidly. "Well, it's not much."

"Hey, slow down I can barely see." She laughs lightly.

Hiccup let's out a small laugh as well and slows down his turning of the pages of the book. "Sorry, I'm a little insecure I guess."

"Well don't be, they're good." Her eyes travel up and down across the pages, trying to soak in every little detail at once. Hiccup has drawn so many different things. There are pictures of marvel characters, mostly Spiderman, flowers and trees, animals and one she recognizes is of the view visible from a window in a lecture room in the Night Fury.

She is woken to life when he closes the book abruptly. "And that's it." He says firmly, tilting his head and meeting her eye. "What do you think?"

She moves back on the rock while holding his gaze. "I _love_ them." She answers, she really tries her hardest to sound as sincere as she can, because she is sincere and doesn't want him to think otherwise.

"Thank you."

They sit and look at the view for a while. Astrid steals a glance at Hiccup, now that they are outside; she notices that his hair is not completely brown; it's more of an auburn colour.

"You know that Fishlegs was bullied right?" She asks after a couple of minutes, disrupting the silence. Hiccup nods. "Did they bully you too?" She asks carefully. When he doesn't answer right away she continues, "It's okay, basically everyone's been bullied."

"Have you? Been bullied?"

She shrugs in response. "Yeah."

He looks at her for a while, "Yeah I was also bullied." He admits.

She has a look of pity in her eyes as she looks at him, he doesn't like it. "Now there is only one question remaining."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." She pauses for effect. "If you're a good guy…" Hiccup leans his head back and closes his eyes to show his disapproval of the turn of topic. But she pushes through, "…How come you acted like a douche?"

"I didn't act like a douche!" He defends. He doesn't sound angry, which is a relief to Astrid, only resigned.

"You made snap judgements about me, and you stood by them even when it turned out they weren't true!"

"I didn—Alright, fine! I don't even know why I'm defending myself anymore. I was a douche. And I'm sorry Astrid. But like you said before, I was only _in disguise_ as a douche. I'm not really one." He pauses and Astrid smiles at him, happy to hear him admit it. "I don't know why, but I get like that sometimes: judgemental and arrogant. If it makes you feel any better, all my judgements, did turn out to be false." He says, and is filled with joy as Astrid smiles even wider at the last statement.

She moves closer. "Maybe…" She begins in a soft tone. "Maybe, you were once hurt, by several people. And it caused you to think that everyone you ever meet will be like those people. And you feel you want to get the upper hand on the new people you meet. So you see it as a race to try to hurt them …before they can hurt you." She finishes by taking his t-shirt between her two fingers and pulls at it a little before she moves back to her original position, further away from him. For some reason, Hiccup sees it as a sign of affection, her touching his t-shirt and he wants her to do it again.

He clears his throat. "That …surprisingly makes a lot of sense." He answers. "You're pretty good at that." He adds with a smile, "Maybe you should become a therapist."

She laughs. "We should probably head back. Lunch is almost over."

10 July 2015


	7. Chapter 7

**Authors Note:**

 **RIN: Relatively Important Notice:** (That's not a real abbreviation) I had to change the mention of a band name in the first chapter. Turns out I should have read the agreements more carefully, you're not allowed to mention real band names. That's why I have now changed it to a fictional band name(Mutant Scarecrows) and fictional lyrics although I haven't changed the song title because it didn't say anything about that. I also had to change the format of the texting conversation because they were not allowed to be in "keyboard dialogue."

If I've broken the rules and guidelines in some other way, let me know how. :)

* * *

 **Chapter 7**

Well back at school, as they enter the cafeteria together, Astrid points at the table where Fish and Ruff are sitting. "There they are!" She quickens her pace and when she reaches the table exclaims: "There's the Harry Potter fan!" while sitting down next to Fishlegs. Hiccup, a few steps behind Astrid, sits down and looks to see Fishlegs' reaction. He can tells he's pretty tense, and he doesn't look at Hiccup.

For Astrid to think that Fishlegs is a _'Harry Potter fan'_ is probably one of his worst nightmares. Hiccup assumes he must've read the messages Hiccup had written, given how he doesn't deny it. "It really is a … piece of art." Fish reluctantly says. And then he changes his tone and puts on a fake sincerity "The books are _so_ much better than the movies though, the movies are _nothing_ compared to the books." Hiccup realises that he is quoting something Hiccup has said in the past. But he says it in a mocking voice, which Astrid doesn't pick up on, but Hiccup can tell Fish is trying to show his annoyance with him for putting him in this situation.

"I can't be bothered to read the books though, they're so _long_. But I need to see them, and I need an expert at my hand. How about this weekend, maybe? We could have a marathon! What do you say? Friday to Saturday, an all-nighter." She says with glee in her eyes, clasping her fingers together.

"I don't know Astrid, if you're going to watch the movies, you should really have Hiccup with you." He motions at Hiccup, who looks bluntly at him. "He's like an encyclopaedia when it comes to that stuff."

"Yeah, well, that's what I meant! We can all join in. What do you say, Ruff?" She turns to Ruffnut, who's been quiet during this conversation.

"Okay first of all: I didn't know you were one of those crazy Harry Potter fans, Fish? Why am I only finding out about this now?" Ruffnut says, accusation evident in her voice. But she doesn't even bother to listen for a reply. "I think I am going out clubbing that night though." She finishes, shifting her attention to her food. She picks at it with her fork.

"Yeah, Ruff, honestly I didn't expect you to come." Astrid replies, patting her on the shoulder. "How about you guys?" She inquires, turning toward them.

"Yeah" Both Fishlegs and Hiccup say at the same time.

"Why not?" Fish smiles before he realises "…Wait… I can't this weekend." Fish says, smile turning into a look of disappointment. "Promised the parentals I'd go home. How about next weekend?"

"Ahhh, no that doesn't work for me, that's the weekend I'm going home." Astrid says. "Looks like it'll have to be this one. But you've probably seen those movies lots of times before anyway, right?" She says to Fishlegs.

"Yeah, that's true." Fish laughs.

"Alright, I'm heading for the gym." Ruff says, standing up. Everyone says their goodbyes as she walks away.

When she's left, Astrid scoots closer to Fish, puts her arms on the table and locks her fingers together.

"I didn't know you'd been bullied, I'm sorry to hear that, those kind of things can really affect you." She says sympathetically.

Hiccup can see Fish tense up again. He is deliberately trying to shut Hiccup out as much as he can by sitting with his back turned to him. "It was tough, but I got through it." He explains sadly. Thankfully, Fish was also bullied in high school, so it's not really a lie.

"I should also leave…" Hiccup mutters quietly, before scurrying of in the same direction Ruffnut went. Astrid said goodbye, Fish however, didn't move a muscle. Hiccup is not worried, as he walks through the corridor, heading for his dorm room, he doesn't have any more classes that day to attend. Sure Fish is rather irritated with him at the moment, it's like he was not looking at Hiccup so much that it felt instead as if he was giving him the angriest look of all time. But he will cool off; they just need to talk first. _It's his own fault anyway, for putting me in that position._

* * *

20 minutes later, when Hiccup is having a meal at the table in the kitchen/hallway of their dorm room, Fish walks in. He feels a bit of anticipation, curiosity at how this will carry out. It's as if most of this day has been leading up to this moment, this conversation. Hiccup studies his tall friend as he makes his way over to him. He sits down at the table slowly and looks him straight in the eye and sighs.

"Whyyy Hiccup? Whyyy did you have to do that?" He moans. Looking agitated.

"I'm sorry!" Hiccup starts, "Honestly! I didn't think, I… I just …wrote…" He says, hoping for some compassion.

"Well, maybe you should have thought some more. I'm in a very difficult position right now. I had to sit there and tell her about when I was bullied," he gestures toward the door, in the direction of the cafeteria. "And then, she went on to tell me about how some guys were really mean to her in her last school."

"To be fair, Fish, you could have thought some more as well, before handing me that phone in the first place, why did you even?" Hiccup retorts, although this might be a mistake. It might result in Fish not handing him the phone the next time. Which, when Hiccup thinks about it, could actually be a blessing.

"I don't know." Fish says, and it sounds as if he wants to end this conversation. He goes over and opens the fridge. "What were you two doing earlier today?"

"Um, well, we were both sent out of class for texting," he starts.

"Right, sorry about that." Fish interrupts, looking up from behind the fridge door.

"No worries." He says, and he continues to explain that they went to the lookout place. Wondering if it's weird for Fishlegs, given how he's clearly interested in Astrid. "We didn't really do much, just talked for a bit." He adds, trying to make it sound boring.

"I see. And on Friday you'll be having a marathon." He says, sitting down on a chair opposite him.

"Yeah… Well it depends." Hiccup searches Fishlegs for any hostility toward him or the situation.

"Depends on what?" Asks Fish.

"It depends on how you feel." He answers. "I can say no if you don't want me to do it?"

"No!" He says forcefully, taking Hiccup by surprise. "Don't get me wrong," he explains. "I would have gone if I wasn't going away … but I think this is for the best, I mean, I would have been clueless about those films." He nods with certainty. And Hiccup knows he's probably right, this is for the best. He feels a nervous twitch in his stomach at the thought of watching movies with Astrid, or is it excitement? Probably both.

* * *

Astrid enters the cold, dark, dorm room after a long day of school and a workout session. It's 10 p.m. The only thing providing light for her right now is the screen of Ruffs Iphone coming from her bed. She takes some careful steps, guiding herself through the kitchen and over to the bed area in the darkness. Her and Ruff do not have the luxury of two separate bedrooms and a separate hallway/kitchen room. Their living room is the area between the beds and the stove. _Sad, but true,_ she thinks as she squints to see better, her eyes not having gotten used to the darkness yet.

"Care to flick the light switch?" Astrid asks irritably. "Why are you lying here in the dark?" Astrid demands, throwing her bag on the floor.

"I am the queen of darkness." Ruff replies in apathy still looking at her phone.

"Sure." Astrid says with sarcasm.

"Hey, I didn't _choose_ the darkness, the darkness _came_ to me, a force of nature. One minute it's bright, next minute, you come in here asking me to flick the light switch." She says while flicking on the light switch by her bed to one of the bedside lamps.

"Finally! I can see! …Now I'm going to eat everything in the fridge." She says, walking over to it.

"Won't take long …don't eat the olives!"

" _Why_ would I eat the olives? I _hate_ olives." Astrid speaks into the fridge.

"You never know."

It's quiet for a while. Astrid is eating a banana, which was the only thing in the fridge, it turns out. Except for the olives of course. She sits down on her bed and checks twitter.

"Hiccup was sent out of a lecture today for texting." Ruff snorts. "Moron. He must have been so obvious, who gets sent out of a lecture for texting?"

Astrid can't help but let out a small laugh as well. She raises her hand with the banana in it. But Ruff isn't looking. "I was …today..."

Ruff turns to see a smiling Astrid raising her hand. "What!" She says, disbelievingly. "You were sent out of a lecture? For texting?" She emphasises every word and sits up straight in her bed, disregarding her phone for once.

"I was sent out of a lecture for texting." She repeats, trying to contain laughter bubbling up inside her.

"Were you texting Hiccup?" Ruff asks.

"No, I was texting Fish."

"…Well, congratulations, you're as big of a moron as Hiccup." She says, plucking up her phone again only to put it back a moment later when she realises, "You were hanging out with him, you entered the cafeteria together."

"We had lunch together." She elaborates. "At the lookout."

"Wow, looks like you go there with everyone but me." Ruff says indifferently, lying down on the bed again and unlocking her phone.

"That was my plan." Astrid takes the last bite of her banana; she walks up and puts it in the bin. "Did you know that Hiccup is really good at drawing? He showed me his notepad."

"The red one? Yeah, he brings it everywhere." Ruff replies, still keeping up her trademark careless tone.

Astrid gets into the bathroom to wash of her makeup, it's gotten a little bit smeared at the edges and she's happy to get it off after a long day. She gets ready for bed. When she finally gets under the covers of her bed she realises just how cold it is. So she puts on a beanie and her mittens and gets into a sleeping position.

"One last thing, Astrid, before you fall asleep." Ruffnut loud-whispers.

"Yeah?" Astrid says without neither moving, nor opening her eyes. She's too tired.

"Next weekend, next Friday, to be precise. Is the day that _The Scorch Trials_ premiers." Astrid feels alarm clocks going off in her body. But she doesn't respond and Ruff continues, "The movie adaptation of your favourite book out of all the Maze Runner books. You've been looking forward to this for I don't know how long, we were going to go together…"

"Just get to the point." Astrid says tiredly, eyes still closed.

" _My point is_ , you're not going away to your parents, not that weekend, there's no way you would have booked it on that weekend." Ruff says confidently. "You were lying before." She adds simply. "And I'm not going to ask why, I'm just going to state the facts. And say goodnight … and also tell you I told you so."

"What did you tell me?" A relieved Astrid asks, relieved she won't be asking why.

"I told you Hiccup has more personality." She says.

Astrid sighs, not wanting to talk about this. "Goodnight," She's barely awake still. "And thanks for not asking why." She says, before falling asleep finally.

11 July 2015


	8. Chapter 8

**Authors note:**

There are Harry Potter spoilers in this chapter.

* * *

 **Chapter 8**

"It's marathon night!" Astrid half yells when Hiccup opens the door. It's seven p.m. and Hiccup is doubtful that this is a good idea.

"You know this will take us about 20 hours, including breaks of course, which I assume we'll be having?" He questions.

"I know, I googled." She says, unfazed. "And yes, of course we'll take breaks." She nods and walks into the TV room and sits on the couch.

"Maybe we don't have to watch _all_ the movies, we can skip the first two." He reasons, following her. He moved the couch to be in front of the TV earlier, so that they could sit comfortably.

"You do know what a _marathon_ is, right?" She gives him a disapproving look. "It's a test of endurance." She explains before he can answer. "We have to watch _all_ the movies. No question about it." She says with conviction.

"You're the boss." He says. He walks over to open the window widely, figuring it'll get really hot in the small room if he doesn't, they'll need plenty of air. He takes a quick look at the surroundings, it's a cloudy day and the sun is about to start setting.

"I didn't know I was the boss." She says, and he turns around to face her. "I will try my best to maintain that title." She smiles and he returns it.

He walks over to the DVD's. "We better get started." He says as he inserts the first movie into the DVD player.

While they are watching the movies, it gets darker and darker until it's completely black outside. Astrid is enjoying the films: they're silly, but lovable. And there is a surprising amount of Internet memes she can now appreciate on another level. "What the hell is a Hufflepuff?" She humorously quotes during the sorting ceremony in the first movie and Hiccup informs her that the quote is from a famous Harry Potter play, which she didn't know before, she'd just seen it floating around on Tumblr.

Astrid continues to ask a lot of questions throughout, because she can tell he loves to explain everything, he also has a lot of fun facts in store for her, which she appreciates. Although maybe it's less the fun facts and more the enthusiasm and passion he shows with his wide green eyes and intense gesticulations as he talks about the characters and the plot.

The night goes on and they're just taking a break, which consists of them grabbing a protein bar each from the kitchen and leaning out the window, breathing some fresh air. "They have a new director for the next one, Alfonso Cuarón, probably the most well-known director they've used for the film, and you'll see a big difference in the tone of this film because of it." He rants as they breathe in the cool outside air, fresh from a recent rainfall during the second movie. Every scent is stronger in Hiccup's nose when it rains, he wonders why that is.

"Let's get on with it." Astrid walks over to pick up the next DVD; it takes her a while to find the right one. "I give up. I don't know what movie the next one is."

"The prisoner of Azkaban." Hiccup sits down on the couch, letting her find it. When she sits down again next to him, she ends up a little closer than he assumes was intended. Her knee is touching his and also a little bit of her foot. A weird feeling erupts inside Hiccup, caused by the small contact. It is as if Hiccup's whole body's sense of touch is transported to his knee and his foot and he is literally feeling heat radiating between them. Every millimetre of him that she is touching tingles. It's a weird but oddly pleasant feeling. But before he knows it, she adjusts her sitting position and moves a centimetre or two and the connection is broken. He wishes he could have captured and preserved it somehow.

The marathon continues, they continue to take breaks between movies, at one point they even go outside on the campus grounds for about ten minutes. Astrid realises that it's so early/late at this point that Ruff has probably gotten home now. _She's probably asleep._ She thinks while they stand outside in the cold. It's strange seeing the campus, usually so full of life, completely dead. Not one window lit up by a light and not one person roaming the grounds except her and Hiccup. It makes it seem like they're the last people on earth.

Hiccup is giving his usual synopsis while pushing the disc into the DVD. "So Voldemort is rising to power and Dumbledore and Harry have to find a way to stop him, basically." He explains to Astrid.

They've been watching movies for a long time and about 13 hours into the marathon, 13 hours of Astrid getting her Harry Potter crash course and Hiccup having to pause and explain to her how it could be that Sirius Black wasn't really a bad guy even though he'd tried to kill Harry during the whole movie, and how Mad-Eye, really was a bad guy even though he'd tried to help Harry during the whole movie, although it wasn't really him, it was someone else who'd pretended to be him, using polyjuice potion, and in reality, Mad-Eye is a good guy…Although he's a bit mental. "Just wait until the last one, it only gets more complicated."

She is feeling like death, basically. And she can't even believe how he can remember all these extra things about all the other characters, he's given her a _redundant_ amount of information such as how things were shot, anecdotes from the set, how things were done differently in the books, the process J.K. Rowling had to go through to keep her information hidden, and long backstories that aren't even in the books for his favourite characters like Remus Lupin, which can be read at apparently.

They've been drinking coke and the sugar has helped them stay awake. The sun rose at some point during the fifth movie but it's still only about 7.30 a.m. on a Saturday. The peaceful atmosphere still lingers on campus and inside Astrid as she leans out the window, taking in some of the fresh morning air. It still feels like the middle of the night to her. Like they're the only ones awake in the world, Hiccup and her are still trapped in their bubble in here, cut of from the rest of the population.

The end credits roll on the next to last movie and it's now about midday. It was a truly beautiful movie, and just like Hiccup pointed out, it almost feels like an indie movie and not so much a Hollywood blockbuster.

"It's the only movie where they actually use muggle music at one time during a scene that wasn't actually in the books although it's a pretty great scene." He is sitting on the couch and looking at the credits while talking to a tired Astrid, who is resting against the pillow with her eyes closed. "Are you awake still Astrid?" Hiccup whispers.

"Yeah, keep talking." She says, not opening her eyes.

"And you know that scene where they are running from Yaxley in the Ministry?" His voice is low and sounds tired Astrid notices, from lack of sleep and having talked a lot.

"Yeah." She answers, wanting him to keep talking, his voice is so soft and soothing to listen to while she is barely awake.

"It's the last scene they shot together on the whole franchise. It was shot in the beginning of 2011, I think. Because they shot the two last movies at the same time." It's so pleasant her head feels numb and she feels a little lightheaded. Right now, she is feeling very content with her split second decision of lying to Fishlegs so that she could spend this time with only Hiccup.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

Astrid will find out in the next chapter.

12 July 2015


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's note:**

A reviewer told me that I've been spelling the word "college" incorrectly; I've been spelling it "collage" which is not the same thing. I am not a native speaker of English and these things can't be avoided. I do use spell check, however since "collage" is an actual word, spell check didn't red mark it and that's what caused the mistake. Anyway, I just wanted to point this out and let you know that I've changed the mistake as I know these things can be annoying, and also to encourage others to point out my mistakes because I will learn from them and hopefully not make them again. J Thank you, guest reviewer!

* * *

 **Chapter 9**

The next morning, Astrid wakes up in a dark room. She has one of those moments where, for about the length of a millisecond, she has no clue where she is. But the second is over and she realises that she is at Hiccup's. Looking at her phone she sees that it's not morning; it's midnight and to her discontent she realises that she has been sleeping for about 12 hours.

 _Where is Hiccup?_

She sits up on the couch where she fell asleep yesterday to have a look around the room. It's pretty dark in there. She spots a blanket laying on the floor a few metres away. _Where did that come from?_

It's dark in the kitchen as well but her eyes have adjusted. She treads over the silent room to carefully open the door leading to one of the presumed bedrooms; she hears the deep breaths of someone sleeping, which means that it is definitely a bedroom. Much to her assumptions Hiccup is lying on the bed, sleeping. He hasn't bothered to close the blinds and some faint light from the window illuminates his features. Astrid studies him for a moment, he is sort of frowning while unconscious but he still looks very peaceful. His hair is a little messy. She gets an urge to walk up to him and get a better look but figures that that would be creepy, and decides instead that she should get back to her own apartment.

To Astrid's gratefulness, the corridor leading to her dorm room is lit up. Although she'd rather not stay there for a longer period of time, given how deserted it feels. When she enters her apartment Ruff is awake, still on her bed and the lights are on.

"Finally you're home! That marathon took a long time."

"I fell asleep and we didn't even finish." Astrid says, walking straight into the bathroom after collecting some different clothes to take a shower, it doesn't matter that she's taking a shower at 12 a.m. because she's slept all day and won't be able to fall asleep anyway, her sleeping pattern is completely ruined.

When she gets out of the shower she is feeling brand new and fresh again, which is nice. Now onto step two: filling her empty stomach... "Wow, you did some grocery shopping for once!" She looks at all the food in the fridge; this is just what she needed.

"I figured you'd be hungry when you got back. How was it? Did you like them?" The false interest in Ruff's voice doesn't suit her as she tries to do small talk, but Astrid refrains from commenting on it.

"The movies? Yeah they were good. I liked them. How was clubbing?" If Ruffnut can pretend to be interested in her marathon, then she will return the favour, she thinks. "Did you meet Eret?"

"Yeah…" Ruff replies, but her casual, happy tone dies and Astrid looks at her to try and read of her face what is wrong. Ruff pauses, trying to find the words.

"Well? Did you talk to him?" Astrid asks, wanting to hurry up the process.

"I did." She trembles. "I actually managed to strike up a conversation with him … we got to talking and he mentioned how he wanted to see the Scorch Trials next weekend. And I …" She raises her voice slightly, "In my defence, I was drunk!"

"Just cut to the chase." Astrid demands, folding her arms, she is sort of seeing where this conversation is going now, but she wishes she didn't.

"And I sort of … told him that I have two spare tickets, thinking that maybe I'd get a chance to hang out with him… But he kind of got the impression that I was _giving_ him two tickets, which I didn't need. And long story short now he's taking his girlfriend!" She hurries the last part. "Apparently he has a girlfriend." She adds, throwing her hands up in the air nervously, searching Astrid's face for signs of anger.

Astrid is quiet. She literally doesn't know what to say; in complete disbelief that this is happening. "The tickets are gone? You don't have them anymore?" She eventually asks in despair.

"Well … because I had them in my purse, you see … and I didn't know what to do!" She defends helplessly. "I'm really sorry Astrid, but we can always book new ones, right?" and she has that look of false hope in her eyes.

"It's the midnight premiere, Ruff!" And she can't keep her anger concealed anymore. "Do you seriously believe there are any tickets left at this point?!" She stomps over to her bed and sits down to have a look. She scrolls her phone for a while and puts it down on the drawer beside her bed.

"Any luck?" She hears Ruffnut.

"What do you think?" She replies irritably.

* * *

On Monday Hiccup is on a lecture as usual, being in college, he has a lot of those. Eret is standing up front, confident, young and ambitious. Talking about things he knows well, already successful in his field.

Fish is next to him as usual, actually paying attention to what Eret is saying and taking notes in top speeds. Ruffnut however, is paying as much attention as Hiccup: zero. He notices, that this time, she's the one texting Astrid, instead of either Fish or himself. And, as 'master of stealth', as she calls herself, she is doing a good job of not getting caught so far. He looks at the phone for a second before he figures he shouldn't look at what they're talking about. But he sees Eret's name appear on the screen and he can no longer help himself.

"I'm sorry, Astrid." _Why is she sorry?_ Hiccup wonders.

"Dude, don't apologise, make it right instead, go and get the tickets back from Eret."

Ruffnut is typing the next message still. Hiccup tries to nonchalantly angle his head in her direction, to give the impression that he's looking at Eret.

"I can't! Then he'll know that I was trying to get him to go with me!"

"No, he won't, just make up some excuse. Say your other friend is a big Maze Runner fan and really wants to go to the premiere."

 _Ohhh,_ Hiccup thought. _So this is about the premiere of the Scorch Trials._ He keeps looking for the next text, with a feeling in his gut that he should not be doing this. Guilt.

"But that won't make sense, why would I give them to him in the first place?"

"That's not my problem, you owe me this."

"But it'll be so embarrassing! Astrid, I'm really sorry, is there anything else I can do?"

But Astrid doesn't answer; instead, Ruffnut gets this reply a few minutes later:

"Congratulations, you got me sent out of class."

Ruffnut stares at the message for a while, before slipping her phone into her pocket once again, and returns her attention to what Eret is saying in that moment.

Hiccup needs to call his dad, he realises. His dad is the CEO of Seattle Film, a company that owns a few of the cinemas in Seattle, which means that maybe, there is a slight change that he can help them get tickets, he's a pretty powerful man after all. The trick, for Hiccup however, is bringing this up with Astrid without making it seem as though he was prying on her text messages with Ruffnut. Which could be a potential challenge, seeing as that was in fact what he did. He'll have to try and make her bring it up in some way, he thinks. But first of all, he needs some alone time with her he decides.

He picks up his phone from where it is seated on the small table in front of him, which is designed for him to put a notepad on, and begins pretend-texting, and also being very obvious about it. Sure enough, a couple of minutes later,

"Hey, you there, if you're going to text in here: don't. Do it outside." Eret points at the door, not breaking eye contact with Hiccup, who barely waits for him to finish the sentence before hurriedly picking up his stuff and is out the door in no time, feeling happy that his plan was a success.

He closes the door and is a little taken aback when he turns around and sees that Astrid is already sitting there on the floor with arms around her legs, she looks sad.

"You too, huh?" He smiles, meaning how she was also sent out.

She smiles back weakly. "We have to stop meeting like this." She says sarcastically.

"What's up? You look sad." He sits down next to her on the floor, frowning.

Shrugging she says, "Yeah, I'm just a bit mad with Ruff." and smiles crookedly, but in a sad way.

Hiccup shifts so that he is facing her more. He tries to sound like this is news to him. "What happened?"

She looks at him, wanting to tell him, it would feel so nice to be able to rant to someone about how Ruff always does this, always puts herself before everyone else and doesn't even think twice before giving away her best friend's opportunity at doing something she has been looking forward to for months! Only for the _slightest_ chance that something _might_ happen with Eret. And Hiccup would probably understand completely and he would probably be a great listener, and comforter. He would probably say something really sweet. Astrid's mind lingers on the thought of Hiccup comforting her. "Sorry, but I'd rather not think about it … or talk about it."

"Well, that's okay." He says, turning back to his original position facing the wall on the other side of the corridor and leaning his head against the wall, pondering how he's going to get on the subject of the lost cinema tickets if Astrid doesn't want to talk about the lost cinema tickets. It's quiet for a moment. "But if you're arguing with Ruff, how come you're waiting here for her?" he inquires. "Or are you waiting for Fish?"

"Neither," she says simply, turning her gaze to him. "I came here for one reason only." She holds his gaze and he waits expectantly, suddenly she punches his arm.

"Aow!" He says, rubbing his arm. It was probably supposed to be playful but it kind of hurt him.

"I wanted to discuss why you didn't bloody wake me!" She says, trying to be stern, but a small smile shines through the act. "We were so close!"

"Uhhh, I guess I didn't think you'd want me to wake you. You looked pretty tired." He defends. In truth, he was tired and thought that if she fell asleep he could go to bed. Maybe a small part of him also didn't want the marathon to end, wanted the possibility of Astrid coming back another time to finish the movie franchise with him, and that was his way of keeping the magic alive a little longer, giving her a reason to come back to him. "Maybe I was scared that if I woke you, I'd get punched in the arm! But tough luck! Didn't manage to avoid that!" He teases.

"Don't you think that I would rather finish our _marathon,_ than get a few hours of sleep? Don't you know me at all?"

"As a matter of fact, I've only known you for about two or three weeks." He declares. "So you can't judge me too much."

 _Has it really only been two or three weeks?_ It feels longer to Astrid. She's grown close to Hiccup in such a short period of time, usually you don't realise you're growing closer to someone until 'it's too late' and they're already in your life. And Astrid couldn't help but notice when he walked out of that door just before, with his hoodie hung loose over his chest, feelings erupted inside her, strong feelings that she couldn't deny.

She is torn from her thoughts when Hiccup stands up. "Alright, we cannot sit around here all day." He stretches out his hand to help her up.

"Where are we going?" She says while heaving herself up to a standing position with the help of his hand, it lingers in hers for a moment before he lets go, not looking at her.

"The lookout of course! Where else?" He says while directing his attention to her and starts walking.

She follows, "You know we are going to have to watch the last movie still, right?" This causes Hiccup to smile before she catches up to him.

* * *

They are laying down on the cold rock on top of the lookout hill, listening to Astrid's Spotify. Hiccup is debating in his mind if he can sing along with Astrid to the lyrics of the Mutant Scarecrows. _I could know the lyrics, as well as Fish, right?_ He desperately wants to sing along, to flaunt his extensive knowledge of old school Scarecrow lyrics. _But what if Astrid starts speculating?_ He almost catches himself wanting Astrid to find out about the secret, so that he can fully be himself with her, but he knows that he must tell her himself instead of letting her find out in some other way.

There is a change of song and the familiar sounds of the piano starts playing. He knows exactly what song this is. It's called When You're Gone, a song he _can_ allow himself to sing along to.

He sings faintly along with the singer, aware that he doesn't have a good singing voice, but he doesn't care. He happens to really like this song after having been introduced to it in 2007 by his sister, who loved Avoir Lavielle back then.

Astrid starts laughing while he sings along; she sits up and looks at him, "You know this song?" she says between her laughs.

He laughs too, "The perks of having three sisters."

"You have three sisters?" She says curiously and her laugh stops.

"Uhh, yeah…" Nervousness is filling him, thank god he didn't tell her that through Fish's phone. Without elaborating, because he does not want to stay on that subject, he continues to sing along with the chorus. Astrid lays down on the rock next to him again and sings along as well. How long can he continue the lies? The longer he waits, the more damage it'll do when he finally tells her, because he _will_ tell her … at some point.

They sing together and when the song finishes, Astrid starts to laugh again, "I can't believe it. You knew _every word_ of that song!" She smiles. "I used to sit in my bedroom with a CD player, listening to that song when it first came out … those were the days."

"Does it make you nostalgic?" Hiccup says before he can stop himself.

Astrid's smile drops and she sits up. "Did Fishlegs tell you about that?"

"Uumm," Hiccup begins, he tries desperately to look oblivious to what she means, but he knows he's already given himself away, that Astrid is seeing right through him. "No." He finally says, but it's obvious he's lying.

"I can't believe he would tell you that." She looks at the ground, frowning. "Well, I guess I didn't say that it was secret..." She argues. The hill goes quiet for a while and Astrid doesn't look at him, but at the view instead. It's pretty obvious that Astrid is mad, no matter what she says.

"He didn't tell me." Hiccup finally says. He can't let Fish take all the blame for this.

"Yeah, maybe I read to much into what you said, I'm sorry. I thought you were referring to something me and Fish had talked about." And she tries to smile, which makes what Hiccup is about to do even more painful.

"No… _Well yes,_ yes I was referring to that." He isn't making much sense and goes quiet again. "But he didn't tell me … Astrid, _I_ was the one texting you." He speaks carefully and she looks bluntly at him, not moving a muscle.

"He sort of gave me the phone… He's sort of been giving me the phone a lot through your conversations. So, it's been me sometimes…" and a pang of guilt punches his stomach when she covers her face with her hands, her first visible reaction to what he is telling her.

"No no no no no, what are you _saying_ right now!" She says into her hands, despair entering her tone of voice. She looks at him again, "That's why you were sent out of class that time and not Fish, right?" Hiccup nods surprised at how quickly she catches up. "And this is not the first time it's happened." he can hear the realisation dawning on her.

"Remember the first time he texted you?"

"Oh, my god it's been going on since the beginning. You've pretended to be Fishlegs, he's pretended to be you." She looks disgusted at the thought. "How much was Fish and how much has been you?"

She looks so hurt he can barely bare it. "I don't know. It's hard to say … I was the one who gave him the Mutant Scarecrow lyrics. I am the one who is a Harry Potter fan. I was bullied, I not only have one sister, but three." Hiccup feels another pang of guilt when he looks at her face and sees how disappointed she looks.

"Well, that wasn't so hard to say was it?" She asks harshly, but she doesn't wait for a reply, she thinks loudly, "I knew there was something weird about it, he was so different from time to time. It was all so strange but I didn't realise it until now." No one says anything for a while and Hiccup tries to think of something that he could say to make everything good again. But before he can think of anything, Astrid speaks again.

"I thought you were a nice guy, in disguise as a douche, _but turns out,_ you're a douche in disguise as a nice guy." She declares calmly. She keeps jumping back and forth between calm and anger. "I don't even know how long you could have gone on with this if you hadn't accidentally slipped up!" Hiccup winces at the harsh words; we're back at anger. "You didn't even tell me after I told you about my childhood!" She almost shouts the last part. "That was private!"

Suddenly Hiccup feels angry, "Honestly, it's not like I committed murder!" He defends, but immediately regrets it when he sees Astrid's even angrier expression at what he said. He curses himself in his mind for getting angry and defensive.

"You've been _lying_ to me for the whole time I've _known_ you. Our friendship is _based_ on a lie. You let me share things with you without me even knowing!" Her voice is harsh and hurt, but then it turns weaker, "You made me trust you and now it turns out that I shouldn't have. It's like… you subconsciously create this image of what someone is like, and when that image breaks, it hurts. And you have to rethink everything you once thought about that person." She pauses. "I built this thing up in my head to be something," and she gestures between them, "But it's not." she sounds disappointed again. "This is too complicated, I can't handle this." She gets up to walk away but she turns around mid walk and when Hiccup sees that her eyes are red, he feels tears of his own coming. "I forgive you." She says. "But we can't be friends, we can't talk anymore, I hope you leave me alone, because you don't need my forgiveness, I've already given it to you." And she leaves Hiccup looking after her as she begins descending the hill on the other side from which they came up, which is a bit of a detour, but she doesn't care, she just wants to get away from Hiccup as fast as possible. Get away from this heartache.

As she climbs down the hill, one step at a time, careful not to trip in her hurry, she can't really understand why it's called _heart_ ache. It's not her heart that's aching, all the pain she feels, she feels in her stomach.

* * *

Astrid slams the door to the dorm room and Ruffnut jumps where she is standing in the middle of the room.

"Geez, I get that you're angry with me but you don't have to take it out on the door." She says, turning around to face her, and her joking tone changes to desperation when she sees that Astrid has been crying. "Oh, my god, Astrid! I'm really sorry about the tickets, I wish there was something I could so! Please don't cry!" She begs.

"I haven't cried because of you. Shouldn't you be in class?" she says dully, not having forgiven Ruff just yet.

"I was but then lunch came around and you weren't there so I came looking for you, I sent you a text but you haven't answered."

Astrid picks up her disregarded phone and sees the text.

"Where are you?"

Astrid types a reply, just for the heck of it while she sits down at the kitchen table. "Back in the dorm room." She types.

Ruff sits down at the table as well and her phone buzzes with Astrid's reply. It's obvious that Ruff is eager to know why she's been crying, however she doesn't ask in her uncertainty of how angry Astrid still is with her, so she decides to tell her herself.

"I'll tell you where I was," Astrid begins her story angrily, "I was at a certain lookout with a certain person. And _as it turns out_ : Hiccup has been texting through Fishlegs phone with me!" She speaks with fake enthusiasm.

"Oooh, so that was why you liked to text with Fish, I _knew_ that didn't make sense!" Ruff exclaims in victory. She then returns to her state of looking sympathetic when Astrid continues.

"He's a liar Ruff, and he didn't even tell me on purpose Ruff! He accidentally slipped up! I am so angry with them both! I mean, how could he do this to me?

"It sounds, like you're just angry with Hiccup, to be honest."

But Astrid isn't listening, "He seemed like such a genuine person." And she can no longer stop the tears.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

Bad day to be Astrid Hofferson!

If there was anything specific that you liked/didn't like about this chapter, please let me know in the review section, I'm thinking a specific scene or a line or maybe something about my writing, etc. It would be interesting for me to know. No review is too short/too long.

19 July 2015


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter 10**

Hiccup has to gather all of his mental strength while he waits for his father to pick up the phone. Talking with Stoick is not the easiest thing. Especially not if you're Hiccup, 'the walking fishbone', as he was called growing up. Probably the least decisive person you can meet, a total pushover. His dad however, is the complete opposite; he walks straight over everybody, that's why he makes such a good Chief. It doesn't make much sense that Hiccup is his son, and not many people believe it, Hiccup himself is not even sure he believes it.

But when Stoick finally picks up the phone after three calls, and Hiccup hears his booming voice, "Hiccup? What's wrong?" he demands, all the assertiveness Hiccup had managed to muster is blown away into thin air.

"Hi, dad… Uh, nothing's wrong I guess." he laughs nervously fiddling with his hair.

"How come you're not studying?" He asks sternly.

"It's not _all_ I do in college dad. I have lunch." He reasons.

"Oh, I see." His dad loses his hard wall for only a moment. "Then why are you calling, what's wrong?" And the demanding tone is back once again. Hiccup rolls his eyes. _Back to square one, I guess._ This is how their conversations usually go about, in circles.

" _Nothing is wrong dad._ But I need your help."

"Why would you need my help if nothing was wrong?" Stoick argues.

But Hiccup isn't having it this time; he needs to push through, for Astrid. "Will you just listen to me please?!" He closes his eyes for a moment, trying to level the emotions that erupted at the thought of Astrid. He had managed to forget about what had happened between them for a fleeting moment in his quest not to decay under his father's wrath. He should talk to his father more often, he realises.

It seems Stoick has finally silenced enough to actually listen to what he has to say, so he begins to explain. "I have this friend," _but we can't be friends, we can't talk anymore…_ Hiccup forces himself to continue speaking through the hurt now that he's finally, for once in his life, managed to get his fathers attention. "Who really wants to go to _the midnight premiere_ of _the Scorch Trials."_ He speaks the last part very clearly because his dad may own some of the cinemas in town, but he sure as hell does not know anything about any movie released after the 1980's. "But it's sold out and I was wondering if there is _anything_ that you could do?" He cringes while he awaits his fathers response anxiously.

"I have your schedule here, and it says that you _do_ have class. Right now."

Hiccup's heart sinks. _Of course,_ of course he didn't really care; he was just checking Hiccup's schedule.

"I do, but I was sent out." He just simply doesn't care anymore.

"For what?!" Hiccup holds the phone away from his ear not to damage his hearing at his fathers shouting.

"For texting, but-"

"For texting?! What are you doing texting when you should be listening to what your teacher says?!"

"Dad will you please just do this for me, how often do I ask you for anything?!" This is the second time he raises his voice during their conversation, even though he's never done such a thing before in his life to his dad.

"You asked me if you could study engineering instead of joining me at the company, and look how well that turned out, skipping classes!"

"I didn't _skip_ , I was _sent out_." He puts his forehead in his palm, very annoyed with this repetitive conversation.

"I don't like you living over there, I can't keep an eye on you and you're turning into some kind of thug, skipping classes for no—"

"Seriously dad, you're not listening—"

"No you're not listening! I didn't send you to that school so that you could go off with your friends instead of attending your classes!"

There is a moment of mutual silence. "Dad, it's for Astrid." He speaks softly.

"Astrid?" his dad asks, bewildered, but he seems to realise something when he goes quiet, a rarity for him.

The quiet continues for a couple of seconds and Hiccup doesn't know if he made his chances better or worse by mentioning some girl his father has never heard of. His dad finally lets out a big sigh and says,

"I'll see what I can do." And he actually sounds sympathetic for once.

Relief washes over Hiccup. "Thanks dad! It's _the midnight premiere of the Scorch Trials,_ two tickets." He can barely contain his enthusiasm.

"Yeah, yeah, I've got it." His dad mutters before hanging up the phone.

And then Hiccup is suddenly all alone on the hill where Astrid left him. While he was talking with his dad he just wanted the conversation to be over, his father is a real mental challenge. But now that the conversation is over, he realises that it was much better than this.

 _I need to get back._

While Hiccup climbs down the hill, he tries desperately not to replay the conversation he'd had with Astrid in his mind, but it's extremely hard. Little things she said, little things he said keeps hitting him like the wind. He tries to focus on the actual wind instead, clearing his mind from the thoughts that are trying to force their way into his head, how the wind makes his overgrown hair dance.

That was probably the last time he'll ever be up on the lookout, a place he'd grown fond of. But as 'summer going on fall' is beginning to loose the summer part of the phrase and it gets colder and darker by the day, Hiccup doubts that he'll spend any of his autumn days up there without Astrid. It'll be too cold.

* * *

His dad finally calls him a couple of hours later, but there is another voice on the other line. The voice of Gobber, his father's colleague and friend, Hiccup's godfather and almost like an uncle to him, the master of telling funny stories involving his dad and crazy happenings. The fun brother of the two, but the less successful, the sidekick, you could say.

"You're in luck." Gobber says it almost like he's trying to make him feel guilty about it and Hiccup sits up on his bed, having completely disregarded the other lessons he was supposed to attend today.

"Hiccup are you there?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm here, that is so great! How did you get them?"

"Some people rescheduled, our server tells us if anyone reschedules in any of the cinemas that we own, so we could easily book them for you and your friend."

"Oh, I'm not going, it's for two of my friends. Can I come and get the tickets now?"

"I see … you're a good boy Hiccup." He says in a very, uncle-esque way.

Hiccup ignores the statement; he doesn't exactly feel like one. "I'll be there in an hour."

He takes the phone off his ear but before he hangs up he hears a faint, "I hope she's worth it." from Gobber.

And then Hiccup is left alone to his thoughts once again.

* * *

"Astrid is seriously mad at you two." Ruffnut walks in through the door and sits down next to himself and Fish in front of the TV. She's not the knocking type. Which is a fact Hiccup has been forced to come to terms with, being friends with her and all. "What are we watching?" she asks. This time however, he's glad she came, because she is exactly the one he needed to see right now.

"Netflix, and she's mad at you too you know." Hiccup counters knowingly.

Ruffnut faces Hiccup; "I should have guessed she'd tell _you_ about that." He receives a disapproving look. "But it seems she's transferred all the anger she had toward me, onto you." She flashes him a wicked smile. "And Fish as well." She adds.

"She didn't tell me. I saw your messages with her this morning." It's pains him to tell her, but this is a piece of information Ruff has to know later, for her to understand why things have to work out the way they have to.

"Dude, did I tell you that you could look at my messages? You are seriously hung up on her." She gives him a judging look.

This causes a certain amount of anger to release inside Hiccup, and he glares at her, but he can't help a slight blush from forming on his cheeks, which makes him even more enraged with Ruff. _Why does she always have to be so insensitive?_ It bothers him when she says things like that, especially with Fish in the room, who is awfully quiet during their conversation, he seems mostly interested in the show, but he glances at them now and again. Still, he probably heard what Ruffnut said and Hiccup doesn't want Fishlegs to think that Hiccup likes Astrid like anything more than a friend. He reaches into his pocket and hands Ruffnut the tickets to shut her up from saying anything else that'll make Hiccup uncomfortable.

"No waaay!" She says to the tickets, holding them as if they were a treasure. She looks up at Hiccup, "Explain."

Hiccup shrugs, "My dad owns Seattle film, and he helped me get them."

"Now I know why you can have a TV in your apartment." She says meaningfully. Hiccup holds back a sigh, _again with the insensitivity._

"So that was what you were doing when you weren't in class?" Fish joins the conversation.

"Yeah." Hiccup had only told Fish that he 'had something he needed to do'. Not wanting to tell Fishlegs too much about what he was doing, he'd given him quite an ambiguous answer.

Ruffnut sits up on the arm of the couch, "Tell me exactly how you managed to get these." She holds the tickets like they're a deck of cards and she's showing him a magic trick.

He gives her a confused look, "I already told you."

"I need more detail." She argues, waving a hand in the air.

He sighs for what feels like the hundredth time today. "I made a call to my dad, asked him if there was anything he could do, got a call a couple of hours later saying that some people cancelled their tickets, and so I went to get them."

Ruffnut looks like she is considering something; she squints her eyes and purses her lips. "How long did it take for you to go and get them?" She asks.

"I don't know … it was about one and a half hour drive there and back again, because of traffic. Why do you ask?"

"I'm trying to get an idea of how much trouble you went through to get these." She explains. "Well, I guess I should thank you, although I doubt you did it for me." She teases, patting Hiccup on the shoulder lightly.

Hiccup gives her an irritated look, "Just go and give them to her already."

She jumps up excitedly, and she is about to leave the room when she stops in her tracks and turns around, she looks serious for once. "Right, I almost forgot, look at the date Hiccup." She hands him one of the tickets.

He looks in the corner of the movie ticket where the date is displayed. _The 16_ _th_ _of September._ This doesn't really tell Hiccup anything, but Ruff waits as he gets his phone from his pocket and looks at the calendar. It's the weekend that Astrid said she was going to her parents. "It's the date she is going to her parents, right?" He looks up to see Ruffnut nodding. "So? Maybe she meant that she was going there the day after."

" _But she isn't._ It doesn't matter what she _meant._ She only said that she couldn't that weekend so she could have the marathon with you last Friday." She tries a sympathetic smile.

Maybe Astrid did feel some of what Hiccup feels for her. For a moment this piece of information makes him happy, but it's soon replaced by -possibly stronger than ever- feelings of regret and hopelessness. What he would have felt about hearing this news earlier today doesn't matter now. So instead he steals a quick glance at Fishlegs to see his reaction, but he meets his eye.

"Honestly it's fine Hiccup." He immediately responds. "Ruff had already told me they were going that weekend, I knew she was lying."

"You knew this whole time?!" Now Hiccup is surprised for real, wide eyes and everything.

"Yeeeah, sort of…" Guilt enters his facial expression.

Just after Ruffnut leaves, Hiccup stands up rapidly, "Oh, shit I forgot…" He mumbles and raises his finger while he goes after Ruff, "Back in a moment."

He walks out in the corridor and Ruff is right there. "You probably shouldn't tell her it was me who got the tickets." He says.

She turns and looks at him slightly annoyed, "And why the hell not?"

He shakes his head, "It's a bad idea. She doesn't want anything to do with me; she's not going to accept that I gave them to her. Plus, you heard what I said before: I looked at your messages and that was how I found out, she'll probably just get even angrier with me. I'm telling you, _it's a bad idea_." He looks at the floor. "She said that I should leave her alone." He adds quietly, sadness clearly apparent in his voice.

Ruffnut looks at him with pity in her eyes. He hates it, hates being pitied. He was always pitied when he was bullied. Pitied by his father, by his sisters, and by his teachers. Now even by his friends.

"You _can't_ tell her." He can see that he's won her over. "Tell her you got the tickets back from Eret or something."

"So you want to try and make things right by lying to her again? Great idea, Hiccup." She says sarcastically.

"I'm not trying to make things right, things will never be right, I've ruined it and it's going to stay ruined." He says angrily, mostly anger at himself, and partly at Ruffnut who keeps acting so at ease and like this is not a big deal when it feels like a huge deal to him.

"Fine. I don't care." She throws her hands up casually and starts walking backwards. "I'll lie and get the credit, all the better." She turns around and leaves; walking with purpose in every step she takes.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

Anything you liked/disliked about this chapter?

July 21, 2015


	11. Chapter 11

**Authors note:**

Harry Potter spoiler in this chapter. Let me know if you want it gone.

* * *

 **Chapter 11**

The days go by slowly and Hiccup doesn't see Astrid once. Not in the cafeteria, not anywhere. Before he knows it, a week has gone by since the last time they were together at the lookout.

He doesn't really talk much, to anyone. Sometimes, Fish will ask him how he's doing, but that's it. It reminds him of how it used to be during those years when he was bullied. He'd feel the way he does now, sort of without purpose, and when he got home, a member of his family would ask him how he's doing, and he would answer saying that he's fine. But they'd know he wasn't. You can almost always tell when someone is fine for real, or when they're just saying that they are. That's why they'd never stop asking, as if he'd tell the truth if they only asked him enough times.

His dad hasn't called either. Why would he? He's got no reason to call. Hiccup himself thought about calling one of his sisters, but thought better of it. At least when he was bullied he'd have his family to ask him how he's doing; now he's only got Fish for that.

 _At least it's raining,_ he thinks, looking out the kitchen window. Had it been sunny it would have felt like the sun was mocking him. 'Why aren't you happy?' 'Why aren't you out in the sun with some friends?' Now he can stay inside moping without feeling guilty about it.

Fish walks out of the TV-room and into his bedroom; on the way over he asks him how he's doing again. "I'm alright." Barely talking all day has made his voice sound raspy. He probably doesn't look all right though, the way he's just sitting by the kitchen table, staring at nothing. He just doesn't feel like doing anything, so he sits. Sits in the light grey t-shirt and blue jeans he's been wearing for three days now. He did just take a shower however, so that's nice, at least he's feeling fresh.

There is a knock on the door. "Can you get it?" Fish asks from his bedroom. Hiccup doesn't answer, doesn't feel like making sounds with his mouth at the moment, but he gets up to open it.

There she is, standing in front of him. He's frozen in his place, not mentally prepared to face her, but he's glad that he is. Holding the doorknob tightly he takes her appearance in. Her slightly wet hair, from being out in the rain, he guesses. Her arms, wrapped around herself in a shielding manor. She's brought out a light jacket, as it's been getting chillier outside this past week. It's long and black, which makes her look like she's going to a funeral.

"We still need to see the last one." She says, but she wears a sad expression all the while. Hiccup knows what she means, but it seems a bit odd to him. They haven't seen each other in a week, the last words she spoke to him were wishes of him leaving her alone, and now she wants to watch a movie? Maybe it's just the oddness of hearing her voice again; during the week that passed he'd forgotten what it sounds like. He'd tried to remember, but he just couldn't.

"Who is it?" Fishlegs yells.

"Astrid." Hiccup answers, causing Fishlegs' room to go quiet. "Okay." He finally says.

Astrid walks ahead of Hiccup into the next room and sits down on the couch. With Hiccup still in the kitchen, she uses her time alone to pull herself together as she feels tears coming, caused by being overwhelmed from seeing Hiccup. He looked so different from the last time she saw him, which she knows is ridiculous because it was only a week ago. Her gaze follows him when he enters the room, but he doesn't meet it. He inserts the DVD of the last Harry Potter movie and joins her on the couch. Still not having said a word to her. When he sits down next to her, she can't help but enjoy the smell of his freshly washed hair and his usual, familiar scent.

Neither of them says anything during the course of the film. When they get to the scene where Lupin is laying motionless on the floor, dead, Hiccup looks over at Astrid and sees that silent tears are making their way down her cheeks.

Once the movie ends and the credits are rolling down the screen, Astrid sits up straighter on the couch, "I really thought he was going to die there for a while." She says in an attempt to break the tension. Hiccup looks at her, he's in a loss for words, doesn't know what to say to her as she's sitting there. She waits a moment before saying her next bit; she lets out a sigh and adjusts her position on the couch so that she is facing him.

"I don't want to be angry anymore." A glimmer of hope appears in Hiccup's eyes, "But I am." She finishes, killing the glimmer.

Hiccup opens his mouth to say something. He speaks with caution and a slight hint of desperation, "Maybe, if I told you what happened from my perspective, then maybe you would find it easier to understand. Understand how things ended up the way that they did, and it would help you forgive me." She can see the childish hope in his eyes, it makes her sad, but the next thing he says makes her even sadder.

His voice trembles and he's got tears in his eyes. "I'm really sorry Astrid, that I hurt you." It's a mere whisper; as if speaking louder would cause the tears to fall, cause him to start sobbing.

Astrid doesn't answer, instead she slides her phone out of her pocket. "Maybe if we went through all the messages, we can sort everything out." The way she speaks makes it sound like she is presenting her hypothesis on a scientific experiment. She really wants to forgive Hiccup, but first, she needs to know the whole truth, she's been looking through the messages all week, debating which messages are from Hiccup and which messages are from Fishlegs, but the uncertainty is driving her mad.

She scrolls back through the messages to the first conversation they had. They start to go through them and Hiccup explains to her that he was supposed to give Fish some Mutant Scarecrow lyrics from the song Astrid was talking about, but instead he just made up the cheesiest thing he could think of. To Hiccup's surprise, Astrid actually laughs when she hears the truth, "Brilliant." She lets out before she can stop herself. Hiccup smiles next to her.

"It's one of my favourite Scarecrow songs, the one I was listening to here."

"The lyrics are quite repetitive, but they're great, yes, they really succeeded with the lyrics on this track." Hiccup agrees. He looks at the rest of the messages, "All the rest of this conversation are us two speaking. I wasn't actually the one typing, I was just commenting on what Fishlegs told me that you wrote and he kept writing what I said."

Hiccup continues to go through the messages, "This is mostly Fishlegs … but this is me. Fish left the room here so I'm the one who typed these out." It doesn't seem like Fish texts Astrid much without Hiccup there.

"Here he just gave me the phone and told me to ask you questions." Astrid frowns. "Uhh, and then I sort of forgot that I was texting from Fishlegs phone, so I was talking about myself." He explains awkwardly. "Fish wasn't too happy with me after that." He says and Astrid laughs in her charming way, he didn't think he'd ever hear that sound again. "And right after this message, I realised that everyone at that lecture was staring at me because I was grinning like an idiot at my phone." He sighs while Astrid continues to laugh. He looks at her and they make eye contact. "That was when I was sent out … and I met you." Her smile falters until it disappears while they hold eye contact. The room is quite dark and they are sitting unnaturally close.

Astrid stands up and begins to walk away. "Where are you going, Astrid?" he calls after her. The front door opens and closes. "Don't go." He whispers to no one, because she obviously can't hear him anymore.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

Would lie to make it clear that when Astrid is talking about the lyrics that she likes, she's really talking about the lyrics from the actual song, "The pros and cons of breathing", not the ones I made up. lololllll

What did you like/dislike about this chapter? Anything make you smile? Anything make you frown?

Thanks for reading!

July 22, 2015


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

She's in a dark room, Hiccup is there, and he has his arm around her. They're watching a movie. She can feel his hand absentmindedly stroking her side lightly, he probably doesn't even realise he's doing it. There is a change of scenery and they are both sitting on the couch facing each other, leaning in close.

The dream is disrupted when Astrid wakes up. _Wow, that was a good dream._ She sits up on her bed, still not quite woken up, still in the mind-set of her dream. It's incredibly cold in the room, when she looks over at the window she sees that it's slightly opened.

"Stupid Ruff..." She mutters and gets up to close the window. October has come around, the trees on campus are yellow and some are slightly red. It's one of those gloomy, hazy October days that always make Astrid feel so calm and collected.

Her thoughts are disrupted when Ruffnut comes barging in through the door carrying her laptop. She can never do anything calmly, everything she ever does she does with force. "Where have you been?" Astrid asks.

She searches the room and finds Astrid by the window, watching her. "Working on the project. Do you want to come on an adventure?"

Squinting, Astrid feels immediate suspicion at this. "What's the adventure?"

"You'll have to see." She teases, crossing her arms and smiling.

"You know…" Astrid starts, leaving the window and taking a few steps toward Ruff. "Usually when you actually have _a real adventure_ in mind: you tell me what it is, and when you don't, you refuse to tell me and I end up going grocery shopping with you." She grins, because it's such stupid tactics.

"Are you implying that I'm deceiving you?"

* * *

Astrid raises her eyebrows, giving Ruff a look.

"Fine, it wasn't a real adventure." She says while pulling the handbrake outside of the grocery store.

"Figures." Astrid smiles and opens the door on her side. When she steps out she feels the brisk autumn wind on her face, she can smell that typical, untitled scent this season innately brings. She feels like she could have it around her forever, but sadly it's only detectable it in the first breath she takes.

They proceed to walk around the store, grabbing things they need, and also a few things they don't need. Astrid walks up to the shelf containing some fall-scented candles to check out the new scents for this year. They're way too expensive however, and the aroma is a bit too strong for her taste. Ruff abruptly grabs her arm and spins her around, causing her to nearly drop the glass lantern.

"They've got pumpkins!" She exclaims, wide-eyed.

"Yeah, it's the middle of October Ruff." Astrid informs, not exactly surprised by what Ruffnut just told her. Leaning in to smell another candle, she honestly cannot believe how the candle makers can think of more ideas for scents. There are literally (okay, not literally) hundreds of them, and that's just for autumn. "Blissful autumn", "crisp morning air", "cozy cabin", you name it.

Astrid is just about to put a candle to her nose when Ruff takes it from her. "Astrid, are we going to carve pumpkins or not?" she asks.

"Oh, you want to carve pumpkins?" This new information brightens Astrid's mood immediately. She gives her a smile, "Yeah!"

* * *

"I hate how when I try and force the knife out of the pumpkin, at first it won't budge, and then it'll come flying at me!" Astrid moans.

They are sitting at their dinner table with music on in the background. There is sticky pumpkin pulp everywhere and Astrid's hands ache from forcing the knife to cut through the rigid exterior of her pumpkin for about half an hour now.

"I forced the knife out of the pumpkin the way you fall asleep, slowly, and then all at once." Ruff says with fake sincerity after a minute of silence, putting her hand that's holding her knife to her chest and Astrid laughs.

Carving pumpkins is pretty hard work, but it's also sort of nice. And it's what October days like these are for.

"Shit, we need to clean this mess up, Hiccup's coming soon and I need to have a shower as well." She says then, trying to check the time on her phone without getting it too smudgy from her fingers that are covered in pumpkin juice. At the mention of Hiccup, Astrid remembers the dream she'd woken up from this morning, the dream involving Hiccup being very close to her face, and the feelings that the dream had evoked. At the time when she had woken up, when her brain had been foggy from having been asleep, it hadn't seemed that strange to her, having had such a dream about Hiccup. But now it feels like a much bigger deal.

"Hiccup's coming?" Astrid asks with dread. Ruff being preoccupied with cleaning up the mess on the table doesn't answer, so she asks again. "Why is Hiccup coming over?"

Ruffnut closes the bin where she just threw away all the pulp and turns around to face her. "Because we need to keep working on the project, we haven't gotten anywhere and we're working on it pretty much last minute."

 _Right, the project._

Ruffnut and Hiccup have been working on a school project for the past couple of weeks. They've been here sometimes and at Hiccup and Fishlegs' place sometimes. It's fine with Astrid that Hiccup's around now and then. They're not exactly friends anymore, but they're also not not friends, if that makes any sense. They exchange pleasantries, but nothing more. Astrid usually just lets Ruff and Hiccup do their thing, although they don't seem to be getting too much work done.

"Did you just throw away all the pulp? We could have used that! I could have made a pumpkin pie!" Astrid rises to help her clean everything off the table while Ruff runs around the table urgently and grabbing stuff left and right.

"Oh come on Astrid, you couldn't make a pumpkin pie." She says in her hurry.

Astrid stops in her tracks, "How hard can it be? You just chuck all the ingredients in and that's it. I'll just read it off the recipe." Astrid waves a hand carelessly. She puts her pumpkin on a drawer next to the front door and lights a candle inside it, she takes a step back to admire her work.

Ruffnut stops from her panicky run around the room and looks at her with intensity. "Astrid, you couldn't bake if your life depended on it. Let's not forget about that time we made those love yummies and you actually _poured_ the shredded coconut we were supposed to use for the toppings into the batter!" When Astrid looks back at her with an approaching look she adds, "You completely _ruined_ the cake Astrid. It just wasn't edible." She shrugs.

They are interrupted by a knock on the door and Ruff rushes to open it. "Hey Hiccup." Astrid shifts awkwardly where she's standing, preparing to face him. She turns around and smiles faintly at him when he meets her eyes; she resumes the cleaning of the mess. "Things have gotten a little bit hectic, but I'm just going to have a quick shower before we do the project thingy. I have pumpkin in my hair and it's everywhere, really." She explains. Hiccup looks around at the room, around at the mess. There are still remains of pulp all over the table, the sink is full of dirty dishes and there is knifes and different cutlery they've used to get the pulp out spread out across the table. _What did they use it all for, even?_ Plates and bowls and etc.

"It's alright." He says, clapping his hands against his legs awkwardly. "I don't mind waiting."

"Right, I figured you wouldn't mind!" Ruff says her final word before closing the shower door and leaving Astrid and Hiccup to a total silence.

Astrid starts on the dishes. She figures she'll get that out of the way before dealing with the table. Suddenly hiccup is right next to her, she's startled by his closeness as he leans in front of her, grabbing the dishcloth. "Just thought I'd help some." He says. They can hear the distant sound of the shower starting in the bathroom.

"Yeah, sure… that's nice of you."

A moment of silence passes before hiccup, now cleaning the table, breaks it. "So how are you?"

"I'm swell, just doing the dishes, you know." She replies nervously.

"Yeah…" He puffs, "I meant more sort of… general. How are you generally?"

"I'm… _fine_." She says pushing on the 'i' in fine. She curses herself for speaking in such an awkward manner.

Hiccup spots the pumpkins Astrid has lined up next to each other. "Nice work." Astrid turns around to see what he's talking about and Hiccup points to the pumpkins.

"Oh, that yeah. Thanks. I love Halloween so Ruff suggested we should carve our pumpkins. It's a tradition after all." Hiccup smiles at that.

Another moment of silence passes. "Hey Astrid." He begins nervously. "I've been meaning to ask you, I just haven't gotten a chance to talk to you alone…"

"Yeah?"

"Um… Why did you leave that time? You know, after the movie … you left so abruptly..."

Astrid gathers her thoughts before she answers. She stops fiddling with the plates she's washing and it's just the sound of the sink and the shower that can be heard. Hiccup has also stopped cleaning the table behind her she registers. "I guess I just wasn't quite ready to forgive you yet." She resumes with the washing. The plates clink together while she scrubs them.

"Are you ready to forgive me now?" He treads.

She turns around hastily and looks at him. "Are you ready to be forgiven?" She says with quite a demanding tone of voice.

Hiccup looks strangely at her, not quite comprehending what she means by that. "Well, yeah, I guess."

"You guess?" All so sudden she started to sound very annoyed to Hiccup, but he can't grasp what had caused this sudden annoyance. Maybe it was simply the fact that he'd brought it up again, the whole … _thing_ … that had happened. "You don't _sound_ ready to me. I mean you haven't made any effort, really, to try and be forgiven!" She's raised her voice slightly now.

The running shower is shut of in the bathroom, but it goes unnoticed by both Hiccup and Astrid.

He leans over the table toward her, "You said that you _had_ forgiven me, and that I was to leave you alone. _Completely_ alone. That's what you wanted." He says to her, upset.

Astrid starts to shout then, "I was just trying to be strong in the moment! I didn't mean that, no one means that!" She pauses and takes a deep breath. "I mean: no one would possibly mean that if they said it."

Ruffnut steps out of the door to the bathroom and looks at them both. She's only wearing a towel, which makes Hiccup slightly uncomfortable, so he focuses on Astrid instead, who is looking as Ruffnut, she has that look on her face again, like they're a bomb that you have to be careful around, like if she'd make one wrong move, it'd explode. "I see you guys are at it again." She says, not caring about the bomb and walking over to where her bed is.

"So you're saying I should have done the opposite of what you told me to?" Hiccup returns to their argument, not minding the interruption.

"Yeah, maybe! Just a simple 'hey Astrid, I think you need to forgive me.' Would have been nice, yes. To know that you actually give a damn if you are!" Astrid is surprised by the words coming out of her mouth; she didn't even know that she was feeling them. Sometimes, that's just the way life is. You have to come face to face with your problems in the purest form to realise that you're actually having them. It feels so good to get this off her chest, to get some rage out of her system, she finds herself feeling a lot of it toward Hiccup. The rage starts to boil when she looks at him and she can't keep it in any longer. All that peacefulness she'd felt this morning is completely wiped out.

"Honestly, you drive me _crazy_ sometimes!" She blurts, and she walks around the table toward him, reducing the distance between them, Hiccup can almost feel the heat radiating from her. "It's like you have no assertiveness!" She feels so good getting this out. "You're just a pushover who does whatever people tell you to, without thinking of the consequences, without realising that you might actually hurt someone!" Her expression transforms from one of anger to one of hurt and Hiccup's does the same at her hurtful words.

"I'm sorry Astrid, I really wanted to apologize. _Of course_ I wanted you to forgive me. I just didn't think you wanted to see me." He looks sad and Astrid breathes heavily during the silence that settles over the room.

Then, Ruffnut speaks. "It was Hiccup who got you the tickets." She says simply and Hiccup turns around to give Ruffnut a look, before he looks back at Astrid for her reaction.

"What?" She asks, not understanding what she's talking about.

"Hiccup was the one who got you the Scorch trials tickets. His dad helped him in some way. He didn't want me to tell you however because he didn't think you wanted anything to do with him, so he said that I were to tell you that I managed to get them instead."

"You did that?" Astrid says in a small voice, turning her attention to Hiccup. "And you didn't tell me?" Her face is blank; she's completely baffled.

"I'm sorry Astrid, I should have told you, and I should have been honest… I'm such a moron!"

In that moment, Astrid finally sees him for what he is, she looks at him and sees this sweet, genuine person, Hiccup, who'll do anything for her and he won't care about getting any praise for it, he's just so attractive in her eyes, so irresistible. She takes four confident steps forward, if there's anything she's sure about, it's this. She presses him against the wall, looks straight into his scared green eyes and to Hiccup's delight she kisses him. It's a passionate kiss although Hiccup is completely caught off guard at first before he reciprocates. Her hands are at the hem of his hair, toying with it and she feels his hands land on either sides of her waist. When Astrid pulls away from the kiss she lays a quick kiss on the surface between his cheek and his eye before she hugs him. She'd thought about kissing him there before once in a fleeting moment.

"Wow, I did not deserve that." Hiccup breaths, slightly out of breath from the kiss.

Astrid pulls away from the hug and looks at him with a smile on her face. "Yeah you did. I know what kind of person you are now. You're the kind of person who will help the ones you care about; regardless of weather you get any credit for it. You're a good guy, in disguise as a douche." She declares.

"I just reckon that moron needed to catch a break for once." Ruffnut interrupts their moment.

* * *

 **Authors note:**

 **And that is where this fic ends. I really wish to thank everyone who's read it, all the people who've been reviewing and the ones who came back and reviewed basically every time.**

 **I began this fic on the 29** **th** **of March, (although I didn't publish it on here until the 8** **th** **of July) and four months later, I've finished it!**

 **I've been incredibly surprised by the amount of enthusiasm I've received. Getting feedback plays a huge part in how fun I'll have writing. This is a very supportive community.**

 **If you have a Hiccstrid fic that you would like me to read, let me know through PM/review/tumblr/anything and I might.**

 **Likes and dislikes on this chapter? General reviews on the fic as a whole? Favourite chapter? Chapter you didn't like?**

July 19, 2015


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